THE  UNITY  OF 
THE  AMERICAS 


ROBERT-E-  SPEE 


The  Unity  of  the  Americas 

A    DISCUSSION    OF    THE    POLITICAL, 

COMMERCIAL,  EDUCATIONAL,  AND 

RELIGIOUS  RELATIONSHIPS  OF 

ANGLO-AMERICA  AND 

LATIN  AMERICA 


BY 

ROBERT   E.    SPEER 

SECRETARY,  BOARD  OF  FOREIGN  MISSIONS  OF  THE  PRESBYTERIAN 
CHURCH   IN   THE   UNITED  STATES  OF   AMERICA 


LAYMEN'S  MISSIONARY  MOVEMENT 

NEW  YORK 

1916 


F/-4I? 


Published  jointly  by 

MISSIONARY  EDUCATION  MOVEMENT 

and 
LAYMEN'S    MISSIONARY    MOVEMENT 


Bancroft  Library 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

INTRODUCTION v 

I.      POLITICAL i 

II.      COMMERCIAL 33 

III.  EDUCATIONAL 63 

IV.  RELIGIOUS 89 


INTRODUCTION 

THIS  small  volume  is*  merely  a  sketch  of  some  of  the 
material  which  the  average  man  may  not  have  at  hand 
regarding  Latin- American  conditions  and  of  some  of 
the  facts  and  principles  which  ought  to  be  before  him 
in  order  that  he  may  think  intelligently  and  sympatheti- 
cally on  the  highly  important  matter  of  our  relations  to 
our  Latin-American  neighbors.  If,  as  these  studies  seek 
to  show,  we  have  some  things  which  can  be  of  service 
to  our  neighbors,  they  also  have  something  to  teach 
us  of  kindness  and  courtesy  and  high  idealism  in  the 
face  of  great  discouragements.  There  is  less  unity  be- 
tween them  and  us  than  there  ought  to  be.  It  is  the 
aim  of  this  little  book  to  quicken  the  desire  for  more. 


POLITICAL 

THE  unity  of  the  Americas  is  an  aspiration  against 
the  facts.  Happily  not  all  the  facts  divide  the  American 
peoples,  but  our  easy  and  optimistic  view  of  the  homo- 
geneity and  community  of  sentiment  of  the  American 
nations  needs  to  be  confronted  with  its  untruth. 

Diverse  Heredities.  The  Anglo-Saxon  or  Teutonic 
nations  of  North  America  and  the  Latin  nations  of  North 
and  South  America  have  diverse  political  and  social 
ancestries  and  are  divided  by  the  consequences  of  their 
unlike  inheritances.  Senor  Pezet,  Minister  of  Peru  to 
the  United  States  in  1913,  set  forth  some  of  these  facts 
in  an  address  on  "Contrast  in  the  Development  of  Nation- 
ality in  Anglo-America  and  Latin  America,"  in  which 
he  pointed  out  the  dissimilar  character,  nature,  surround- 
ing physical  conditions,  encountered  difficulties,  racial 
habits,  political  ideals,  and  family  life  of  the  two  bodies 
of  colonists: 

"Your  territory,  at  the  time  of  the  advent  of  the  white 
man  from  Europe,  was  more  or  less  of  a  virgin  terri- 
tory, inhabited  by  savage  and  semi  savage  nomadic  tribes, 
thinly  scattered  all  over  a  very  vast  area;  while  our 
territory  was,  to  a  very  great  extent,  organized  into  states 
in  a  measure  barbaric,  but  nevertheless,  semicivilized, 
densely  populated,  and  concentrated  in  a  manner  to 
make  for  cohesion.  .  .  . 

"As  the  news  of  the  discovery  of  the  New  World 


2  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

invaded  the  European  countries,  two  types,  that  were  to 
mold  the  destinies  of  the  wonderlands  beyond  the  seas, 
were  brought  into  play ;  the  one  formed  of  the  oppressed 
and  persecuted  by  religious  intolerance,  the  other  of 
the  adventurous  soldiers  of  fortune,  in  quest  of  gold  and 
adventures. 

"Both  of  these  started  out  with  set  purposes ;  the  op- 
pressed and  persecuted  came  to  the  New  World  to  build 
up  new  homes,  free  from  all  the  troubles  left  behind; 
while  the  adventurous  came  bent  on  destroying  and  carry- 
ing away  everything  they  could  lay  their  hands  on.  So 
here  we  have  the  true  genesis  of  the  formation  of  na- 
tionality in  Anglo-  and  Latin  America  in  the  two  great 
classes,  the  permanent  and  the  temporary,  the  one  to  build 
up,  the  other  to  tear  down  and  destroy.  The  one  came 
with  reverence,  the  other  with  defiance;  both  with  an 
equally  set  purpose,  but  the  one  with  humility  in  his  heart, 
the  other  proud  and  overbearing:  the  one  full  of  tender- 
ness born  of  his  religious  zeal,  the  other  cruel  and  un- 
scrupulous. .  .  . 

"Let  us  glance,"  continues  Senor  Pezet,  "at  the  types 
of  men  who  came  to  your  and  to  our  sections  of  the 
continent.  The  colonists  of  Anglo-America  came  from 
those  countries  of  northwestern  Europe  where  there  was 
the  greatest  freedom,  the  nearest  approach  to  republican 
institutions  and  government  of  the  people  and  by  the 
people,  existent  at  the  time.  England,  Scotland,  and 
Wales,  the  Netherlands,  French  Huguenots,  Scandina- 
vians, and  Germans  were  the  stock  from  which  were 
evolved  the  American  colonies, 

"The  conquerors  of  Latin  America  were  militarists 
from  the  most  absolute  monarchy  in  western  Europe, 


POLITICAL  3 

and  with  these  soldiers  came  the  adventurers.  And 
after  the  first  news  of  their  wonderful  exploits  reached 
the  mother  country,  and  the  first-fruits  of  the  conquest 
were  shown  in  Spain,  their  most  Catholic  majesties, 
Ferdinand  and  Isabella,  felt  it  their  duty  to  send  to  the 
new  kingdoms,  beyond  the  seas,  learned  and  holy  monks 
and  friars,  men  of  science,  and  scions  of  noble  families. 
With  these  came  men  of  means  and  of  great  power  at 
home.  They  brought  a  very  large  clerical  force,  com- 
posed mainly  of  younger  sons  of  the  upper  classes ; 
each  one  eager  to  obtain  a  sinecure,  trusting  to  his  rela- 
tives and  powerful  sponsors  to  better  his  condition,  and 
in  time,  get  his  promotion  to  more  important  and  more 
lucrative  positions.  .  .  . 

"Our  men  did  not  bring  their  women  and  families 
until  many  years  after  the  conquest.  In  consequence, 
the  Spaniards  from  the  very  commencement  took  to 
themselves  Indian  women  and  their  offspring  became  the 
mestizos,  a  mixed  race  that  the  haughty  and  pure  Cas- 
tilians  in  Spain  never  countenanced,  although  they  were 
of  their  own  flesh  and  blood.  Later  on,  when  conditions 
became  more  settled,  the  Spaniards  brought  their  families, 
and  after  a  time  the  Creoles  came  into  existence.  These 
were  the  offspring  of  European  parents  born  in  the  New 
World."1 

Racial  Confusion.  How  could  anything  but  differ- 
ence of  racial  character  develop  out  of  such  difference 
of  ancestry?  The  Indian  blood  in  the  United  States  has 
practically  disappeared.  In  1900  the  population  of  the 
United  States  was  made  up  roughly  of  one  half  of  British 

*Don  Federico  Alfonso  Pezet,  "Contrast  in  the  Development 
of  Nationality  in  Anglo- America  and  Latin  America,"  4-7. 


4  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

strain,  three  eighths  of  other  European  strains,  and  one 
eighth  Negro.  The  dominant  blood  was  European  un- 
mixed with  either  Indian  or  Negro.  In  Latin  America, 
as  Senor  F.  Garcia  Calderon  says:  "the  three  races — 
Iberian,  Indian,  and  African — united  by  blood,  form  the 
population.  ...  In  the  United  States  union  with  the 
aborigines  is  regarded  by  the  colonists  with  repugnance ; 
in  the  South  [Latin  America]  miscegenation  is  a  great 
national  fact;  it  is  universal. 

"It  is  always  the  Indian  that  prevails,  and  the  Latin 
democracies  are  mestizo  or  indigenous.  The  ruling 
class  has  adopted  the  costume,  the  usages,  and  the  laws 
of  Europe,  but  the  population  which  forms  the  national 
mass  is  Quichua,  Aymara,  or  Aztec.  ...  Of  the  total 
population  of  Peru  and  Ecuador  the  white  element  only 
attains  to  the  feeble  proportion  of  6  per  cent.,  while  the 
Indian  element  represents  70  per  cent,  of  the  population 
of  these  countries,  and  50  per  cent,  in  Bolivia.  In  Mexico 
the  Indian  is  equally  in  the  majority,  and  we  may  say 
that  there  are  four  Indian  nations  on  the  continent: 
Mexico,  Peru,  Ecuador,  and  Bolivia.  .  .  . 

"The  invasion  of  Negroes  affected  all  the  Iberian 
colonies,  where,  to  replace  the  outrageously  exploited 
Indian,  African  slaves  were  imported  by  the  ingenuous 
evangelists  of  the  time.  In  Brazil,  Cuba,  Panama,  Vene- 
zuela, and  Peru  this  caste  forms  a  high  proportion  of  the 
total  population.  In  Brazil  15  per  cent,  of  the  popula- 
tion is  composed  of  Negroes,  without  counting  the  im- 
mense number  of  mulattoes  and  sambos.1  Bahia  is  half 
an  African  city.  .  .  . 

"A  sambo  or  sambo  is  the  offspring  of  a  Negro  and  a  mulatto 
or  an  Indian.  The  latter  union  is  here  meant. 


POLITICAL  5 

"Is  unity  possible  with  such  numerous  castes?  Must 
we  not  wait  for  the  work  of  many  centuries  before  a 
clearly  American  population  be  formed?"1 

Divergent  Political  Ideals.  The  Latin  and  Anglo- 
Saxon  nations  of  America  have  had  also  wholly  different 
political  discipline.  The  latter  were  real  colonies  of  the 
mother  countries.  The  former  were  not.  "Absolutism 
in  government,  monopoly  in  matters  of  commerce  and 
finance,  intolerance  in  questions  of  dogma  and  morality, 
tutelage  and  rigorous  isolation:  these  were  the  founda- 
tion of  Spanish  colonization/'2  says  Calderon,  and  he 
thinks  the  methods  practised  by  the  Dutch  and  English 
in  their  colonies  were  not  essentially  different.  But 
there  were  many  and  fundamental  differences.  In  Latin 
America,  Lord  Bryce  observes,  "there  were  no  elected 
assemblies  or  elected  officials.  All  power  came  from 
above ;  the  people  had  nothing  to  do  with  administration, 
and  were  not  enough  permitted  to  subject  it  to  public 
criticism.  ...  In  the  English  North  American  colonies 
the  management  of  church  affairs  belonged  to  the  laity 
as  well  as  to  the  clergy;  and  the  New  England  Congre- 
gational churches  in  particular,  founded  on  the  principles 
of  liberty,  became  direct  exponents  of  popular  feeling." 

When  independence  came  in  South  America,  "the  in- 
habitants, accustomed  to  be  ruled  by  others  in  state  and 
in  church,  had  never  been  given  a  chance  of  learning  to 
think  of  government  as  their  own  business  nor  of  them- 
selves as  responsible  for  public  order.  When  a  long 
and  sanguinary  war  had  destroyed  the  habit  of  obedience 

*F.  Garcia  Calderon,  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress, 
356-360. 
2  Ibid.,  51. 


6  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

to  constituted  authority,  they  were  remitted — constitution 
or  no  constitution — to  that  primitive  state  of  things  in 
which  force  prevails.  .  .  .  Whoever  travels  through 
these  countries, — I  include  Mexico  and  Central  America, 
but  not  Chile  or  Argentina, — and  whoever,  having  thus 
obtained  some  knowledge  of  their  physical  and  racial 
character,  studies  their  history,  finds  himself  driven  to 
three  conclusions.  The  first  is  that  these  states  never 
have  been  democracies  in  any  real  sense  of  the  word. 
The  second  is  that  they  could  not  have  been  real  democra- 
cies. To  expect  peoples  so  racially  composed,  very  small 
peoples,  spread  over  a  vast  area,  peoples  with  no  practise 
in  self-government,  to  be  able  to  create  and  work  demo- 
cratic institutions  was  absurd,  though  the  experience 
which  their  history  has  furnished  to  the  world  was  needed 
to  demonstrate  the  absurdity.  The  third  conclusion  is 
that  injustice  is  done  to  the  Spanish  Americans  by  cen- 
sures and  criticisms  which  ignore  these  fundamental 
facts.  .  .  .  To  understand  these  countries,  one  must 
think  of  them  as  having,  under  the  rule  of  the  Spanish 
crown  and  of  the  church,  dropped  two  centuries  behind 
the  general  march  of  civilized  mankind/'1 

Among  the  leaders  of  Latin  America  and  the  leading 
foreign  students  of  Latin-American  conditions,  there  are 
many  who  frankly  advocate  oligarchical  government. 
Professor  Bingham  expresses  his  sympathy  with  this 
view:  "The  great  San  Martin  foresaw  the  advantages 
of  oligarchy  or  monarchy  and  advocated  something  of 
the  kind  for  the  Spanish  provinces  of  South  America 
when  they  secured  their  independence.  Unfortunately, 

Barnes  Bryce,  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions, 
535,  537,  539,  549- 


POLITICAL  7 

his  farsighted  statesmanship  ran  counter  to  the  bom- 
bastic notions  of  'liberty*  held  by  the  uneducated  Creoles 
who  had  secured  control  of  the  reins  of  government  and 
the  result  was  the  creation  of  republics."1 

And  Calderon,  speaking  for  himself,  says  frankly,  "a 
young  Venezuelan  critic,  Senor  Machado  Hernandez, 
having  studied  the  history  of  his  country,  rent  as  it  has 
been  by  revolutions,  considers  that  the  best  form  of  gov- 
ernment for  America2  is  that  which  reinforces  the  at- 
tributions of  the  executive  and  establishes  a  dictatorship. 
In  place  of  the  Swiss  referendum  and  the  federal  organi- 
zation of  the  United  States,  autocracy  is,  it  seems  to  us, 
the  only  practical  means  of  government."  He  allows 
exceptions,  however:  "In  some  states  in  which  the  eco- 
nomic life  is  intense,  as  in  the  Argentine,  Chile,  Brazil, 
and  Uruguay,  benevolent  despotism  does  not  mark  the 
high- water  limit  of  national  development;  there  new 
parties  are  forming  themselves,  and  the  caudillos  [politi- 
cal bosses  of  the  old,  military  type]  will  soon  disappear."3 

The  Latin-American  Spirit  and  Character.  Such  a 
racial  and  political  ancestry  has  produced  a  Latin-Ameri- 
can spirit  and  society  unlike  the  spirit  and  society  of 
Anglo-Saxon  America.  "The  absence  of  that  class  of 
intelligent  small  landowners,  which  is  the  soundest  and 
most  stable  element  in  the  United  States  and  in  Switzer- 


1  Hiram  Bingham,  Across  South  America,  155. 

2  North  American  readers  should  note  that  throughout  the  book, 
in  the  quotations  from  Sr.  Calderon,  "America"  and  "Americans" 
are  used  as  referring  to  Latin  or  South  America,  showing  that 
the  monopoly  of  the  name  by  the  United  States  is  not  accepted 
by  Latin  Americans. 

*  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  374,  372. 


8  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

land,  and  is  equally  stable,  if  less  politically  trained,  in 
France  and  parts  of  Germany/'  says  Lord  Bryce,  "is 
a  grave  misfortune  for  South  and  Central  America."1 
Says  Professor  Ross:  "In  each  of  these  republics  there 
are  men  of  purpose  as  high  and  ideas  as  sound  as  one 
will  find  anywhere.  But,  in  the  absence  of  an  intelligent 
self-assertive  commonalty  to  respond  to  their  appeals 
and  to  clothe  them  with  power,  this  type  come  into  office 
only  by  accident,  so  that  in  general  the  man  who  rules 
is  either  the  army  officer  with  troops  to  place  and  keep 
him  in  authority,  or  else  the  politician  who  has  gathered 
about  himself  a  great  number  of  followers  animated  by 
the  prospect  of  capturing  political  jobs  and  of  being  let 
in  on  such  graft  as  the  country  may  be  made  to  yield."2 
And  what  of  Latin-American  character?  Is  there  such 
a  character,  a  real  Latin- American"  personality?  Sr. 
Calderon  answers  for  the  higher  critical  thought  of 
Latin  America  itself;  he  quotes  Bolivar:  "We  are  not 
Europeans,  nor  Indians  either,  but  a  kind  of  halfway 
species  between  the  aborigines  and  the  Spaniards ;  Amer- 
ican by  birth,  European  by  right,  we  find  ourselves  forced 
to  dispute  our  titles  of  possession  with  the  natives,  and 
to  maintain  ourselves  in  the  country  which  saw  our  birth 
in  spite  of  the  opposition  of  invaders:  so  that  our  case 
is  all  the  more  extraordinary  and  complicated.  .  .  . 
Let  us  be  careful  not  to  forget  that  our  race  is  neither 
European  nor  North  American;  but  rather  a  composite 
of  America  and  Africa,  than  an  emanation  from  Europe, 
since  Spain  herself  ceased  to  be  European  by  virtue  of 
her  African  [Arab]  blood,  her  institutions,  and  her 

1  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  533* 
2Edward  A.  Ross,  South  of  Panama,  332,  333. 


POLITICAL  9 

character."  And  Calderon  himself  analyzes  keenly  the 
Latin- American  spirit.  It  "is  not  a  thing  apart;  it  is 
formed  of  characteristics  common  to  all  the  Mediterra- 
nean peoples.  French,  Greeks,  Italians,  Portuguese,  and 
Spaniards  find  therein  the  fundamental  elements  of  their 
national  genius,  just  as  in  antiquity  the  Greek  women 
found  in  Helen  the  reflection  of  their  own  beauty.  To 
this  spiritual  synthesis  Spain  contributes  her  idealism; 
Italy,  the  paganism  of  her  children  and  the  eternal  sug- 
gestion of  her  marbles;  France,  her  harmonious  edu- 
cation. 

"In  the  Iberian  democracies  an  inferior  Latinity,  a 
Latinity  of  the  decadence  prevails ;  verbal  abundance,  in- 
flated rhetoric,  oratorical  exaggeration,  just  as  in  Roman 
Spain.  The  qualities  and  defects  of  the  classic  spirit 
are  revealed  in  American  life;  the  persistent  idealism, 
which  often  disdains  the  conquests  of  utility;  the  ideas 
of  humanity  and  equality,  of  universality,  despite  racial 
variety ;  the  cult  of  form ;  the  Latin  instability  and  vivac- 
ity; the  faith  in  pure  ideas  and  political  dogmas:  all 
are  to  be  found  in  these  lands  oversea,  together  with  the 
brilliant  and  superficial  intelligence,  the  Jacobinism,  and 
the  oratorical .  facility.  Enthusiasm,  sociability,  and 
optimism  are  also  American  qualities. 

"These  republics  are  not  free  from  any  of  the  ordinary 
weaknesses  of  the  Latin  races.  The  state  is  omnipotent ; 
the  liberal  professions  are  excessively  developed ;  the 
power  of  the  bureaucracy  becomes  alarming.  The  charac- 
ter of  the  average  citizen  is  weak,  inferior  to  his  imagina- 
tion and  intelligence;  ideas  of  union  and  the  spirit  of 
solidarity  have  to  contend  with  the  innate  indiscipline  of 
the  race.  These  men,  dominated  by  the  solicitations  of 


io          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

the  outer  world  and  the  tumult  of  politics,  have  no  inner 
life;  you  will  find  among  them  no  great  mystics,  no 
great  lyrical  writers.  They  meet  realities  with  an  exas- 
perated individualism. 

"Indisciplined,  superficial,  brilliant,  the  South  Amer- 
icans belong  to  the  great  Latin  family;  they  are  the 
children  of  Spain,  Portugal,  and  Italy  by  blood  and  by 
deep-rooted  tradition,  and  by  their  general  ideas  they 
are  the  children  of  France.  A  French  politician,  M. 
Clemenceau,  found  in  Brazil,  the  Argentine,  and  Uru- 
guay, 'a  superabundant  Latinism;  a  Latinism  of  feeling, 
a  Latinism  of  thought  and  action,  with  all  its  immediate 
and  superficial  advantages,  and  all  its  defects  of  method, 
its  alternatives  of  energy  and  failure  in  the  accomplish- 
ment of  design.5  "x 

National  Distinctions.  The  governments  which  the 
Latin-American  race  and  spirit  have  established  and 
conducted  cannot  be  indiscriminately  generalized  with- 
out injustice.  "There  is  as  great  a  difference  between 
the  best  and  the  worst  of  them  as  there  is  between  the 
best  and  the  worst  of  European  monarchies.  .  .  . 

"We  may  distinguish  three  classes  of  states.  The  first 
consists  of  those  in  which  republican  institutions,  pur- 
porting to  exist  legally,  are  a  mere  farce,  the  government 
being,  in  fact,  a  military  despotism,  more  or  less  op- 
pressive and  corrupt,  according  to  the  character  of  the 
ruler,  but  carried  on  for  the  benefit  of  the  executive  am: 
his  friends.  The  second  includes  countries  where  ther<; 
is  a  legislature  which  imposes  some  restraint  upon  th< 
executive  and  in  which  there  is  enough  public  opinioi 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  75,  287,  288. 


POLITICAL  li 

to  influence  the  conduct  of  both  legislatures  and  execu- 
tive. In  these  states  the  rulers,  though  not  scrupulous  in 
their  methods  of  grasping  power,  recognize  some  re- 
sponsibility to  the  citizens  and  avoid  open  violence  or 
gross  injustice.  The  third  class  are  real  republics,  in 
which  authority  has  been  obtained  under  constitutional 
forms,  not  by  armed  force,  and  where  the  machinery  of 
government  works  with  regularity  and  reasonable  fair- 
ness, laws  are  passed  by  elected  bodies  under  no  executive 
coercion,  and  both  administrative  and  judicial  work  goes 
on  in  a  duly  legal  way."1 

The  general  Latin- American  principle  is  not  federation 
but  unity.  As  to  political  fraud  and  oligarchical  domi- 
nation and  revolutions  the  facts  are  not  denied.  "In 
Chile,"  says  Professor  Ross,  "the  reliance  of  the  oli- 
garchy is  not  on  force  at  the  ballot-box  but  on  fraud." 
"Educated  in  the  Roman  Church,"  says  Calderon,  "Amer- 
icans bring  into  politics  the  absolutism  of  religious  dog- 
mas; they  have  no  conception  of  toleration.  The  domi- 
nant party  prefers  to  annihilate  its  adversaries,  to  realize 
the  complete  unanimity  of  the  nation ;  the  hatred  of  one's 
opponents  is  the  first  duty  of  the  prominent  politician. 
The  opposition  can  hardly  pretend  to  fill  a  place  of 
influence  in  the  assemblies,  or  slowly  to  acquire  power. 
It  is  only  by  violence  that  the  parties  can  emerge  from 
the  condition  of  ostracism  in  which  they  are  held  by  the 
faction  in  power,  and  it  is  by  violence  that  they  return  to 
that  condition.  Apart  from  the  rule  of  the  caudillos  the 
political  lie  is  triumphant;  the  freedom  of  the  suffrage 
is  only  a  platonic  promise  inscribed  in  the  constitution; 

1  Bryce,  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  $26, 
54i,  542. 


12          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

the  elections  are  the  work  of  the  government;  there  is 
no  public  opinion.  Journalism,  almost  always  oppor- 
tunist, merely  reflects  the  indecision  of  the  parties. 
Political  statutes  and  social  conditions  contradict  each 
other ;  the  former  proclaim  equality,  and  there  are  many 
races;  there  is  universal  suffrage,  and  the  races  are 
illiterate ;  liberty  and  despotic  rulers  enforce  an  arbitrary 
power.  ...  It  is  to  the  excessive  simplicity  of  the 
political  system,  in  which  opinion  has  no  other  means  of 
expression  than  the  tyranny  of  oligarchies  on  the  one 
hand  and  the  rebellion  of  the  vanquished  on  the  other, 
that  the  interminable  and  sanguinary  conflicts  of  Spanish 
America  are  due.J>1 

American  Disunity.  Many  of  the  political  weak- 
nesses of  Latin  America  have  equivalents  in  the  United 
States,  but  it  is  clear  that  Latin  and  Teutonic  America  are 
fundamentally  separate  and  unlike.  But  where  is  there 
unity  anywhere  in  North  and  South  America?  It  is  not 
in  Canada.  From  the  beginning  the  Dominion  has  been 
troubled  by  a  radical  racial  discord  and  its  geographical 
configuration  is  such  that  each  of  the  three  great  divisions 
of  Canada  has  closer  natural  relations  southwards  than 
it  has  with  its  neighboring  Canadian  people.  It  is  not 
in  the  United  States.  For  the  first  seventy-five  years 
of  our  history  our  politics  centered  in  an  issue  of  division 
and,  since  the  Civil  War,  besides  the  Negro  problem  we 
have  had  increasingly  the  problem  of  immigrant  assimila- 
tion, and  again  and  again  our  national  political  cam- 
paigns have  been  waged  over  supposed  conflicting  sec- 
tional interests.  It  is  not  in  any  Latin-American  land. 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  369-371. 


POLITICAL  13 

Each  one  of  these  is  a  strange  composite  of  race  stratifica- 
tion and  indiscriminate  race  blending.  There  is  no 
unified  race  in  any  Latin-American  -people.  The  unity 
is  not  to  be  found  within  any  nation,  north  or  south. 
And  it  does  not  exist  between  nations.  The  United 
States  and  Canada  m  are  more  distinctly  separated  to-day 
than  ever  in  their  history.  Between  the  different  Latin- 
American  nations,  in  spite  of  innumerable  proposals  for 
consolidation,  there  is  no  prospect  of  union  and  though 
there  is  now  creditable  peace,  there  have  been  bitter  wars 
and  there  are  deep  jealousies  and  divisions.  Their 
political  traditions  and  favorable  geographical  condi- 
tions made  the  union  of  the  United  States  possible.  The 
South  American  colonists  were  never  so  united  as  to  be 
able  to  make  one  great  nation.  " Scattered  over  an  enor- 
mous area,  separated  by  the  greatest  natural  boundaries 
that  nature  has  produced,  it  was  scarcely  to  be  expected 
that  they  too  should  not  follow  the  traditions  of  their 
race  and  build  up  local  governments  instead  of  forming 
a  federation.  The  historical  and  geographical  reasons 
that  prevent  the  formation  of  confederations  have  also 
militated  against  the  building  up  of  strong  national 
governments."1 

And  their  relations  to-day  do  not  greatly  converge.  On 
the  other  hand,  Calderon  says,  "we  observe  among  them 
a  tendency  toward  further  disagreement,  toward  an 
atomic  disintegration.  Originally  a  different  and  a 
wider  movement,  in  the  sense  of  the  close  union  of  similar 
nationalities,  did  manifest  itself.  The  contrary  principle 
prevails  to-day,  and  it  results  in  the  separation  of 

'Bingham,  Across  South  America,  58,  59. 


I4          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

complementary  provinces  and  the  conflict  of  sister 
nations.  .  .  . 

"To-day  these  peoples  do  not  know  one  another.  Paris 
is  their  intellectual  capital,  where  their  poets,  thinkers, 
and  statesmen  meet.  In  America  everything  makes  for 
separation."1  As  against  our  easy  rhetorical  glorification 
of  our  imaginary  American  unity  it  is  well  to  recall 
these  facts. 

It  is  necessary,  if  we  are  to  do  true  thinking  and  to 
be  fitted  to  deal  with  duty,  that  we  should  remember 
the  unlikeness  and  disunity  of  Latin  and  Anglo-Saxon 
America.  "Teutonic  Americans  and  Spanish  Americans 
have  nothing  in  common  except  two  names,  the  name 
American  and  the  name  republican.  In  essentials  they 
differ  as  widely  as  either  of  them  does  from  any  other 
group  of  peoples,  and  far  more  widely  than  citizens  of 
the  United  States  differ  from  Englishmen,  or  than 
Chileans  and  Argentines  differ  from  Spaniards  and 
Frenchmen/'2  The  present  leading  Latin  Americans 
emphasize  this  difference.  "Essential  points  of  differ- 
ence," says  Calderon,  "separate  the  two  Americas.  Dif- 
ferences of  language  and  therefore  of  spirit;  the  differ- 
ence between  Spanish  Catholicism  and  the  multiform 
Protestantism  of  the  Anglo-Saxons;  between  the  Yankee 
individualism  and  the  omnipotence  of  the  state  natural 
to  the  nations  of  the  South.  In  their  origin,  as  in  their 
race,  we  find  fundamental  antagonisms;  the  evolution  of 
the  North  is  slow  and  obedient  to  the  lessons  of  time,  to 
the  influences  of  custom  the  history  of  the  southern 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  336,  344. 

2  Bryce,  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  507. 


POLITICAL  15 

peoples  is  full  of  revolutions,  rich  with  dreams  of  an 
unattainable  perfection.  .  .  . 

"Instead  of  dreaming  of  an  impossible  fusion  the  Neo- 
Latin  peoples  should  conserve  the  traditions  which  are 
proper  to  them.  The  development  of  the  European  in- 
fluences which  enrich  and  improve  them,  the  purging  of 
the  nation  from  the  stain  of  miscegenation,  and  immigra- 
tion of  a  kind  calculated  to  form  centers  of  resistance 
against  any  possibilities  of  conquest,  are  the  various 
aspects  of  this  Latin-Americanism/'1 

The  United  States  Distrusted.  And  it  is  just  as  well 
for  us  in  the  United  States  and  Canada  to  realize  that 
Latin  America  does  not  love  us  and  is  not  occupied 
in  gazing  with  longing  upon  our  prosperity  and  with 
admiration  upon  our  blameless  political  righteousness. 
It  distrusts  and  misbelieves  our  purposes.  It  derides 
our  commercialism.  It  looks  to  France,  not  to  us,  for 
ideas  and  ideals.  £  "It  is  evident,"  says  Manuel  Ugarte, 
"that  nothing  attracts  us  toward  our  neighbors  of  the 
North.  By  her  origin,  her  education,  and  her  spirit, 
South  America  is  essentially  European.  We  feel  our- 
selves akin  to  Spain,  to  whom  we  owe  our  civilization, 
and  whose  fire  we  carry  in  our  blood ;  to  France,  source 
and  origin  of  the  thought  that  animates  us ;  to  England, 
who  sends  us  her  gold  freely;  to  Germany,  who  supplies 
us  with  her  manufactures ;  and  to  Italy,  who  gives  us 
the  arms  of  her  sons  to  wrest  from  the  soil  the  wealth 
which  is  to  distribute  itself  over  the  world.  But  to  the 
United  States  we  are  united  by  no  ties  but  those  of  dis- 
trust and  fear/'2  Sr.  Calderon  calls  us  "the  great  plutoc- 

1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  311,  312. 

2  John  Bigelow,  American  Policy,  23. 


16          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

racy  of  the  North,"  "The  Yankee  peril;"  our  policy 
toward  Chile  he  calls  "indecisive,  turbid,  Machiavelic." 
He  monopolizes  "America"  as  a  term  of  speech  applied 
to  South  America,  as  we  have  monopolized  it  for  the 
United  States.  To  be  unified  with  the  North  American 
spirit  would  be  racial  suicide,  he  thinks.  "Where  Yankees 
and  Latin  Americans  intermingle,  you  may  better  observe 
the  insoluble  contradictions  which  divide  them.  The 
Anglo-Saxons  are  conquering  America  commercially  and 
economically,  but  the  traditions,  the  ideals,  and  the  soul 
of  these  republics  are  hostile  .to  them."  He  declares, 
"To  save  themselves  from  Yankee  imperialism  the  Amer- 
ican democracies  would  almost  accept  a  German  alliance, 
or  the  aid  of  Japanese  arms ;  everywhere  the  Americans 
of  the  North  are  feared."  He  sees  no  real  unity  in  the 
United  States.  He  does  see  "the  triumph  of  vulgarity," 
the  increase  of  divorce  and  criminality,  "plebeian 
brutality,  excessive  optimism,  violent  individualism,  con- 
fusion, uproar,  instability."  It  is  with  Europe,  and  not 
with  the  United  States  and  Canada.,  that  Latin  America 
would  identify  its  commercial,  political,  and  cultural 
interests.  "We  find,"  he  says,  "practical  mind,  industrial- 
ism, political  liberty  in  England;  organization  and  in- 
struction in  Germany;  in  France,  inventive  genius, 
culture,  wealth,  great  universities,  democracy.  From 
these  dominating  people  the  New  World  should  receive 
the  legacy  of  Western  civilization  directly.  Europe 
offers  to  the  Latin- American  democracies  what  they  ask 
of  Saxon  America,  which  was  itself  formed  in  the 
schools  of  Europe."1 

The  people  of  the  United  States  think  of  themselves 

1Bigelow,  American  Policy,  24. 


POLITICAL  17 

as  so  animated  with  the  spirit  of  justice  and  good-will 
that  they  cannot  conceive  how  other  people  should  mis- 
trust them.  But  in  the  case  of  Latin  America  we  gave 
opportunity  enough  for  distrust  in  our  war  with  Mexico 
alone,  of  which  General  Grant  said  that  it  was  "one  of 
the  most  unjust  ever  waged  by  a  stronger  against  a 
weaker  nation." 

The  Monroe  Doctrine.  The  Monroe  Doctrine  is  the 
most  familiar  principle  in  our  relation  to  Latin  America. 
It  had  been  foreshadowed  in  declarations  of  Washing- 
ton, Jefferson,  and  Madison,  but  it  received  its  form  and 
name  from  President  Monroe  in  1823.  It  grew  out  of 
a  dispute  with  Russia  over  the  limits  of  her  possessions 
in  the  Northwest  and  alarm  at  the  possible  extension  to 
America  of  the  purpose  of  the  Holy  Alliance  of  Prussia, 
Austria,  and  Russia.  It  declared  ( I )  that  "the  American 
continents,  by  the  free  and  independent  conditions  which 
they  have  assumed  and  maintain,  are  henceforth  not  to 
be  considered  as  subjects  for  future  colonization  by  any 
European  power;"  (2)  that  it  did  not  comport  with  our 
policy  to  take  part  "in  the  wars  of  the  European  powers 
in  matters  relating  to  themselves;"  (3)  that  the  European 
and  American  systems  of  government  are  essentially 
different  and  that  the  European  system  cannot  be  ex- 
tended to  America.  With  existing  colonies  or  depen- 
dencies the  United  States  would  not  interfere,  but  the 
United  States  could  not  countenance  any  extension  and 
"with  the  governments  who  have  declared  their  inde- 
pendence and  maintained  it,  and  whose  independence  we 
have,  on  great  consideration  and  on  just  principles,  ac- 
knowledged, we  could  not  view  any  interposition  for  the 
purpose  of  oppressing  them,  or  controlling  in  any  other 


i8          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

manner  their  destiny,  by  any  European  power,  in  any 
light  than  as  the  manifestation  of  an  unfriendly  disposi- 
tion toward  the  United  States."  This  was  the  original 
doctrine.  It  has  been  given  successive  interpretations, 
however,  which  at  one  time  narrowed  and  at  another 
broadened  its  scope.  Mr.  Seward,  at  the  time  of  the 
Maximilian  Empire  in  Mexico,  made  no  reference  to  it 
in  his  discussions  with  the  French  government.  And 
President  Polk  in  1845,  while  he  pushed  out  the  meaning 
of  the  declaration  in  some  regards,  yet  mentioned  only 
North  America.  Bigelow  in  his  excellent  little  book  on 
American  Policy  traces  the  development  of  the  Doctrine 
and  its  distinctions  from  and  its  confusion  with  the 
Bolivar  idea  of  a  Latin- American  alliance,  the  Washing- 
ton precept  of  isolation  of  the  United  States  from  Euro- 
pean politics,  the  dominance  of  the  United  States  in  the 
western  hemisphere,  and  the  idea  of  Pan- Americanism. 

For  many  years  the  Doctrine  was  a  bond  of  good-will 
between  Latin  America  and  the  United  States.  The 
Latin-American  nations  gratefully  accepted  the  strength 
and  protection  which  it  gave.  But  two  things  among 
others  have  tended  to  make  the  Doctrine  a  rock  of  of- 
fense. One  was  its  extension,  in  the  political  thought  of 
the  United  States,  to  cover  the  claim  of  the  United  States 
to  practical  sovereignty  over  all  the  western  hemisphere. 
Can  we  blame  Latin  America  for  resenting  this  attitude 
of  mind?  The  other  ground  of  objection  to  the  Monroe 
Doctrine  to-day  is  the  feeling  of  Latin  America  that 
it  is  able  to  look  after  its  own  affairs,  that  it  prefers 
European  relationships  to  the  domination  of  the  United 
States,  and  that  the  influence  of  the  United  States  is 
more  to  be  feared  than  any  other  peril.  There  are  some 


POLITICAL  19 

who  would  abrogate  the  Doctrine  or  let  it  fall  into 
abeyance.  Others  would  have  the  United  States  invite 
Argentina,  Brazil,  and  Chile  to  unite  with  the  United 
States  in  maintaining  it.  Others  would  let  history  stand 
and  would  have  the  United  States  continue  to  act  alone, 
doing  what  is  right  and  serving  others  as  it  can,  while 
they  would  cultivate  to  the  fullest  extent  the  develop- 
ment of  good-will  and  confidence  and  common  under- 
standing through  the  growth  of  Pan-Americanism,  that 
tightening  of  bonds  which  the  Pan-American  Union  has 
done  so  much  to  promote. 

American  Unity  a  Reality.  Enough  has  been  said 
about  the  elements  of  American  disunity.  Let  us  look 
away  from  these  to  the  elements  of  union.  There  are 
many  of  these  and  they  are  far  stronger  than  such  writers 
as  Calderon  and  Ugarte,  representative  though  they  be 
of  the  thought  of  Latin  America,  are  ready  to  allow. 
Latin  America  and  Anglo-Saxon  America  do  already 
have  more  in  common  than  either  has  with  Europe  as 
a  whole.  What  are  some  of  these  things?  (i)  The 
principle  of  democracy.  It  is  true  that  Latin  America 
thinks  the  United  States  to  be  a  plutocracy  and  that  we 
think  the  Latin-American  nations  to  be  oligarchies,  but" 
as  a  matter  of  fact  the  democratic  principle  is  inveterate 
in  each.  No  Latin-American  nation  has  ever  been  in 
danger  of  turning  monarchy,  however  autocratic  and 
prolonged  its  presidential  dictatorship.  Sr.  Pezet  says 
that  without  having  inborn  in  them  any  of  the  principles 
of  true  democracy,  the  Latin-American  nations  became 
over  night  as  it  were  democratic  and  representative  re- 
publics. But  there  was  more  democracy  there  than  Sr. 
Pezet  allows,  and  the  Latin-American  spirit  to-day  is 


20          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

immovably  democratic.  Titles  and  rank  and  dynastic 
interests  are  alien  to  it.  It  loves  freedom.  It  is  more 
akin  to  the  spirit  of  the  United  States  than  to  the  spirit 
of  France  or  any  European  race.  (2)  Latin  America 
and  Anglo-Saxon  America  have  the  common  charac- 
teristics which  came  from  the  struggle  to  tame  great 
areas.  Japan  is  one  third  the  size  of  Venezuela,  but  its 
population  is  as  great  as  that  of  all  South  America. 
South  America  has  a  problem  of  nature  subjugation 
more  than  forty-eight  times  that  of  Japan.  We  have 
fought  a  good  part  of  our  battle  and  have  the  qualities 
resulting  from  it.  Latin  America  is  just  entering  a 
nature  discipline.  (3)  Our  political  community  of  in- 
terest is  real  and  fundamental.  Drago  and  Calvo  of 
Argentina  and  Rio  Branco  and  Ruy  Barbosa  of  Brazil 
have  striven  as  notably  as  our  own  statesmen  "for  the 
development  and  institution  of  an  American  international 
law."  All  the  American  nations  deplore  and  must  seek 
together  to-  protect  themselves  against  the  system  of  state 
relationships  an.d  diplomacy  which  has  plunged  Europe 
into  the  ruin  and  carnage  of  its  present  war.  (4)  The 
American  nations  have  a  common,  traditional  love  of  in- 
'ternational  peace.  They  have  never  built  up  great  arma- 
ments or  sought  to  preserve  peace  with  one  another  by 
rivalry  in  arming  each  against  the  other.  Before  the 
European  War  it  was  said;  "The  twenty  armies  of 
Latin  America  aggregate  on  a  war  footing  about  1,5.00,- 
ooo  men.  Taking  the  army  of  the  United  States,  in- 
cluding the  militia  and  volunteers,  as  2,000,000,  we  get 
3,500,000  as  the  total  of  the  American  military  coali- 
tion. This  force,  hardly  capable  of  united  action,  is  less 
than  the  war  army  of  any  one  of  the  three  leading  military 


POLITICAL  21 

powers  of  Europe — France,  Germany,  Russia."1  There 
have  been  wars  in  Latin  America  and  periods  of  revolu- 
tion and  anarchy  and  bloody  dictatorship,  but  the  heart 
of  all  America  is  a  heart  of  peace.  It  is  a  different  heart 
from  that  of  the  militaristic  peoples.  (5)  America  is  less 
of  a  Babel  than  any  other  continent.  Two  languages 
practically  cover  all  America.  Portuguese  is,  of  course, 
different  from  Spanish,  but  they  are  mutually  intelligible. 
There  are  Indian  dialects  by  the  score,  but  these  will  die 
away  writh  popular  education.  English  is  taught  through- 
out Latin  America,  and  Spanish  increasingly  in  the 
United  States.  And  what  is  more  significant,  we  have 
more  common  thought  by  far  than  binds  any  other  two 
continents.  (6)  We  are  united  by  a  common  faith  in 
and  zeal  for  education.  (7)  We  are  also  united  by  a 
common  spirit  of  hope.  We  are  all  Americans.  "Seldom 
in  Spanish  America  does  one  hear  any  one  speak  of  the 
place  his  ancestors  came  from.  .  .  .  Seldom  do  South 
Americans  or  Mexicans  seem  to  visit  Spain.  .  .  .  For 
the  Spanish  Americans  there  seems  to  be  no  past  at  all 
earlier  than  their  own  war  of  independence."2  It  is  true 
that  France  has  supplanted  Spain,  and  that  France  means 
Paris,  but  it  is  not  the  past  of  Paris  that  appeals.  The 
Latin- American  people  are  a  people  of  the  future.  They 
and  we  are  moving  forward  together  into  new  things. 

Common  Problems.  Above  all,  the  Latin-American 
people  and  ourselves  are  facing  great  common  problems. 

Immigration.  The  section  on  "The  Significance  of 
Latin  America  to  the  Life  of  the  World  in  Domiciling 

1  Bigelow,  American  Policy,  155. 

2Bryce,  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  514, 
515. 


22          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

now  Overcrowded  Populations"  in  the  Report  of  the 
Commission  on  Survey  and  Occupation  to  the  Congress 
on  Christian  Work  in  Latin  America  at  Panama  in  Febru- 
ary, 1916,  sets  forth  the  facts  with  regard  to  immigra- 
tion and  they  cannot  be  better  stated. 

"Latin  America  is  one  of  the  few  remaining  large 
sections  of  the  world  at  once  productive  and  yet  sparsely 
occupied.  History  is  repeating  itself  in  the  turning  hither 
of  many  to  find  homes  under  more  favorable  economic 
conditions  than  those  under  which  they  have  been  liv- 
ing. With  an  area  of  about  8,500,000  square  miles  it 
has  a  population  of  about  80,000,000,  or  less  than  ten 
persons  to  each  square  mile.  Argentina,  with  an  area 
of  1,153,000  square  miles,  has  a  population  of  about 
7,500,000,  or  less  than  seven  to  the  square  mile.  New 
York  state  with  49,000  square  miles  has  a  population  of 
9,000,000.  In  other  words,  Argentina  has  twenty-three 
times  the  area  of  New  York  state  and  about  seven  ninths 
of  the  population.  If  Argentina  were  as  densely  popu- 
lated as  New  York  state,  her  people  would  number  220,- 
000,000.  Brazil  has  over  200,000  square  miles  of  terri- 
tory in  excess  of  the  whole  of  continental  United  States, 
but  has  less  than  one  fourth  as  many  people.  Chile,  with 
a  territory  nearly  as  large  as  Norway  and  Sweden,  has 
less  than  one  half  the  population.  .  .  . 

"About  1,000,000  immigrants  entered  the  Latin- Amer- 
ican countries  in  1913,  of  whom  about  45  per  cent,  re- 
turned. Italy  and  Spain  supply  most  of  the  immigrants. 
Many  Portuguese,  Russians,  French,  Germans,  Syrians, 
Britons,  Austrians,  Swiss,  Japanese,  Chinese,  East  In- 
dians, and  other  people  are  also  entering.  While  the 
number  departing  may  appear  large,  it  is  not  excessive 


POLITICAL  23 

when  compared  with  the  corresponding  ebb  in  the  United 
States  from  which  twenty-five  per  cent,  reemigrated  in 
1913  and  forty  per  cent,  in  1912.  The  French,  Spanish, 
and  Portuguese  do  not  have  to  change  their  type  of  civili- 
zation and  are  soon  absorbed  into  the  life  of  the  people. 
The  English,  Germans,  and  North  Americans  retain 
their  national  habits  more  tenaciously,  but  in  the  second 
and  third  generations  are  assimilative.  .  .  . 

"Latin  America  had  a  population  of  15,000,00x3  a  cen- 
tury ago;  to-day  it  has  about  80,000,000.  Formerly 
immigration  was  restricted  to  the  Latin  race.  With 
transportation  facilities  multiplying  and  cheapened  and 
the  Panama  Canal  open,  these  lands  face  all  the  congested 
areas  in  the  world.  On  the  east  their  doors  open  to 
Europe  and  Africa;  on  the  west,  to  the  millions  of  Asia. 
Latin  America  will  have  its  day  in  the  twentieth  century. 
Calderon  predicts  a  population  of  250,000,000  by  the 
end  of  the  century.  There  are  many  who  believe  it  can 
maintain  a  population  of  500,000,000  or  one  third  the 
world's  present  total.  Reclus  makes  the  statement  that 
Latin  America  can  feed  one  hundred  persons  per  kilo- 
meter, or  over  2, 000,000,000.' n 

Social  Problems.  This  immigration  must  be  assimi- 
lated, and,  while  the  climatic  pressures  are  of  course 
automatically  active,  Latin  America  lacks  the  assimilative 
agency  of  universal  elementary  education.  The  elements 
which  constitute  the  labor  class  in  Argentina  and  Chile 
are  economically  restless.  "Not  long  ago,"  says  Pro- 
fessor Ross,  "Enrico  Ferri,  the  Italian  sociologist,  told 
the  Santiaguans  that  the  social  question  will  find  Chile 


^Report  of  Commission  I  on  Survey  and  Occupation,  14-17. 


24          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

* 

worse  prepared  to  meet  it  than  any  other  country.  He 
was  right.  Blind  to  the  signs  of  the  times,  the  masters 
have  neglected  popular  education,  so  that  once  these  be- 
nighted masses  come  to  feel  a  sense  of  wrong  they  will 
turn  savage  and  destructive.  The  most  thoughtful  men 
in  Chile  anticipate  the  outbreak  within  fifteen  or  twenty 
years  of  a  bloody  labor  revolt,  which  even  the  soldiers 
will  not  be  able  to  quell  because  it  will  be  universal."1 
Latin  America  has  a  huge  battle  to  fight  against  bad 
sanitation  and  hygienic  conditions  which  needlessly  in- 
crease the  death-rate  and  impair  national  efficiency.  In 
Lima  the  infant  death-rate  is  double  that  of  Hamburg  or 
New  York.  In  Chile  one  third  of  the  children  die  under 
one  year  of  age.  It  ought  to  be  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
lands  in  the  world.  In  Concepcion  46  per  cent,  of  the 
babies  die.  What  can  be  done  to  abate  disease  has 
been  shown  in  Rio  de  Janeiro,  which  has  been  trans- 
formed from  a  place  of  death  into  one  of  the  loveliest 
cities  in  the  world.  Latin  America  is  awaking  to  the 
necessity  of  fighting  alcoholism  which  combines  with 
unhealthful  living  conditions  to  debase  some  of  the  Latin- 
American  nations.  Of  Chile,  Professor  Ross  says :  "The 
neglect  of  public  hygiene  may  be  measured  from  the 
fact  that  in  one  of  the  finest  climates  in  the  world  the 
death-rate  equals  that  of  Russia,  being  more  than  twice 
that  of  the  United  States  and  Western  Europe  and  a 
half  more  than  the  mortality  of  Brazil  and  Argentina. 
The  avarice  of  the  great  wine  growers  has  prevented  any 
state  check  to  an  alcoholism  which  cannot  be  matched 
elsewhere  on  the  globe."2  North  and  South  America 

^South  of  Panama,  376. 
2  Ibid.,  373- 


POLITICAL  25 

have  the  same  battle  to  fight  against  this  immeasurable 
evil. 

Sr.  Pezet  has  spoken  of  the  lax  moral  ideals  brought 
by  the  early  conquerors.  And  Sr.  Calderon  is  even  more 
outspoken  with  regard  to  the  ethical  inheritance  which 
Latin  America  has  had  to  transcend.  "Sensuality  and 
mysticism  were  the  pleasures  of  the  colonists.  .  .  . 
Away  from  home,  a  host  of  illegitimate  unions,  of  concu- 
bines, of  clandestine  amours."  Latin  America  comments 
with  just  horror  on  our  divorce  evil.  And  at  home  it  has 
to  struggle  with  the  marriage  problem  and  illegitimacy, 
the  latter  calling  for  more  lenient  judgment  than  could 
be  claimed  where  civil  marriage  prevails  or  the  fees 
for  ecclesiastical  marriage  are  less  exacting.  Accord- 
ing to  the  census  of  Brazil  in  1890,  2,603,489  or  be- 
tween one  fifth  and  one  sixth  of  the  population  are 
returned  as  illegitimate.  Mr.  W.  E.  Curtis  says  that  in 
Ecuador  more  than  one  half  of  the  population  are  of 
illegitimate  birth.  At  one  time  in  Paraguay,  after  the 
long  wars,  it  was  estimated  that  the  percentage  of  illegiti- 
mate births  was  over  90  per  cent.  In  Venezuela,  accord- 
ing to  the  official  statistics  for  1906,  there  were  that  year 
47,606  illegitimate  births,  or  68.8  per  cent.  In  Chile  the 
general  percentage  is  33  per  cent.,  and  the  highest  in 
any  department  a  little  over  66  per  cent.  In  England  the 
percentage  is  6  per  cent.,  and  in  France  and  Belgium, 
7  per  cent.  In  Uruguay,  in  1906,  27^2  per  cent,  of  the 
births  were  illegitimate.  The  statistics  would  seem  to 
show  that  the  moral  conditions  in  Brazil  are  better  than 
in  any  other  South  American  land  unless  it  be  the  Argen- 
tine, for  which  no  statistics  of  illegitimate  births  are 
available. 


26          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

The  Plenary  Council  of  the  Latin-American  Bishops 
held  in  Rome  in  1899,  unflinchingly  described  the  moral 
conditions  which  it  deplored  in  Latin  -America.  In  its 
Acts  and  Decrees  the  Council  declared :  "The  widespread 
pollution  of  fornication  is  to  be  deplored  and  condemned, 
but  especially  the  most  foul  pest  of  concubinage,  which, 
increasing  both  in  public  and  in  private,  in  great  cities 
as  well  as  in  country  villages,  is  leading  not  a  few  men 
of  every  station  to  eternal  destruction." 

The  Advanced  Nations.  Thus  far  we  have  spoken 
of  Latin  America  as  a  whole,  but,  as  was  suggested  in 
a  previous  section,  it  is  no  more  a  complete  unity  than 
the  United  States.  Argentina,  Brazil,  Chile,  and  Uru- 
guay are  so  much  more  advanced  and  stable  than  the 
other  republics  as  to  form  a  group  by  themselves.  Argen- 
tina is  the  strongest  and  at  present  the  richest  and  most 
progressive.  Its  society  has  shifted  most  from  the  old 
colonial  order.  The  Italian  element  ranks  close  to  the 
Spanish  in  the  national  character.  Its  capital  is  the 
largest  city  of  the  world  south  of  the  equator.  It  is 
the  Latin-American  Paris.  "The  forces  contending  for 
the  soul  of  the  Argentine  people  are  the  same  that  we 
know  so  well — democracy  and  plutocracy.  The  problem 
is  how  to  transform  the  spirit  of  the  Creole  society  with- 
out at  the  same  time  losing  the  poise,  the  self-restraint, 
the  sense  of  honor,  and  the  idealism  fostered  in  the 
dominant  element  of  the  old  regime,  just  as  they  were 
fostered  in  the  bygone  planter  aristocracy  of  the  old 
South.  .  .  .  Our  people  ought  to  feel  a  sisterly  sym- 
pathy with  this  new  motley  people,  engaged  in  subduing 
the  wilderness  and  making  it  the  seat  of  civilization.  We 
ought  to  understand  the  problems  forced  upon  them  by 


POLITICAL  27 

the  disposal  of  a  vast  public  domain,  the  urgent  need  of 
means  of  transportation,  the  exclusive  reliance  upon 
foreign  capital,  excessive  dependence  upon  oversea 
markets,  heterogeneous  immigration,  sudden  fortunes, 
the  spread  of  the  get-rich-quick  spirit,  wastefulness  in 
government  expenditures,  and  the  reign  of  sordid  in- 
terests in  public  life.  Have  we  not  had  them  all?"1 

Brazil  is  the  largest  Latin-American  land.  Its  area 
is  3,290,564  square  miles.  It  is  one  half  of  South 
America.  It  is  nearly  as  large  as  Europe  and  larger  than 
Australia  plus  Germany.  It  has  more  than  one  third  the 
population  of  South  America.  It  is  the  most  oppressively 
taxed  land  in  South  America;  next  to  Argentina  it  has 
been  most  affected  by  immigration;  it  has  the  largest 
Negro  population ;  it  ranks  second  in  trade ;  its  people 
are  singularly  friendly  and  amiable,  and  they  have  done 
more  by  themselves  to  develop  their  country  than  any 
other  South  American  people. 

Chile  is,  in  Calderon's  judgment,  "a  republic  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon  type."  The  names  of  influential  Chilean 
families  show  how  much  Anglo-Saxon  blood  is  in  the 
nation.  It  is,  like  Argentina,  a  land  of  great  estates  held 
chiefly  by  absentees  and  the  produce  of  the  fields  flows 
into  the  cities.  This  is  better  at  least  than  in  Argentina 
where  the  wealth  flows  out  to  England  and  Germany. 
No  Latin- American  land  exceeds  Chile  in  energy  or 
stamina.  "Neither  lottery  nor  bull-fight  has  ever  struck 
root  in  Chile."  The  Indian  strain  has  given  it  a  touch 
of  truculence.  The  nitrate  finds  taken  from  Peru  have 
relieved  it  of  the  burden  of  normal  taxation.  Property 


ss,  South  of  Panama,  137,  138. 


28          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

under  $2,000  is  not  taxed,  and  on  property  above  that  the 
maximum  tax  rate  is  three  mills  per  dollar,  or  about  one 
tenth  of  what  we  pay  in  many  communities  in  the  United 
States. 

Mexico.  Sr.  Calderon  has  drawn  an  unbiased  pic- 
ture of  Mexico  as  Diaz  left  it:  "He  reorganized  the 
finances.  In  1876,  at  the  beginning  of  Diaz's  rule,  the! 
Mexican  imports  amounted  to  28,000,000  pesos  (silver) 
and  the  exports  to  32,000,000;  in  1901  the  amount  of  the 
former  was  143,000,000  and  of  the  latter  148,000,000. 
The  imports,  a  proof  of  the  wealth  of  the  country,  had 
increased  fivefold ;  the  exports,  a  sign  of  agricultural  and 
mineral  production,  had  increased  almost  in  proportion. 
In  twenty  years  (1880-1900)  the  yield  of  the  mining 
industry  increased  from  24,000,000  to  60,000,000  and  in 
the  same  period  twenty  banks  were  founded.  .  .  . 

"He  governed  with  the  aid  of  the  'scientific'  party — a 
group  which  believes  in  the  virtue  and  power  of  science, 
exiles  theology  and  metaphysics,  denies  mystery,  and 
confesses  utilitarianism  as  its  practise  and  positivism  as 
its  doctrine.  The  Mexican  politicians,  in  renouncing 
Catholicism  after  the  Reformation  and  the  passing  of 
the  Jacobin  laws,  have  not  abandoned  dogma  and  absolu- 
tism in  doctrine  and  in  life.  As  in  modern  Brazil,  posi- 
tivism is  becoming  the  official  doctrine.  .  .  . 

"The  scientific  party,  intoxicated  by  an  orgy  of  utili- 
tarianism, has  not  sought  to  arrest  the  great  plutocracy 
of  the  North  by  means  of  European  alliances. 

"Unity,  wealth,  peace:  these  are  the  magnificent  fea- 
tures of  modern  Mexico,  the  admirable  work  of  the 
dictatorship.  The  Yankee  peril;  lay  dogmas  which 
fetter  intellectual  evolution;  a  level  of  utilitarian  medi- 


POLITICAL  29 

ocrity  without  ideals  of  expansion,  without  culture,  with- 
out the  true  Latin  characteristics ;  popular  ignorance  and 
fresh  revolutions :  these  are  the  disturbing  aspects  of  this 
long  period  of  tutelage."1  What  inevitably  followed 
•this  autocratic  substitution  for  democracy  we  all  know. 
The  democracy  reasserted  itself,  and  needs  help  from 
friends.  It  is  absurd  for  us  to  assume  that  poor  Mexico, 
denied  education  and  gripped  in  the  monopolistic  absorp- 
tion of  a  "scientific"  oligarchy,  must  be  dealt  with  as 
a  stable  and  developed  state,  now  that  the  untrained  peo- 
ple have  uprisen.  Instead  of  hostility  and  misjudgment 
she  needs  from  us  constructive  help  in  projecting  a  new 
agricultural  democracy  and  a  system  of  national  in- 
dustries and  moral  education. 

Progress  Inevitable.  Sooner  or  later  a  new  situation 
will  arise  in  every  Latin- American  land,  either  by  proc- 
ess of  peaceful  development  or  through  revolution  and 
war.  These  lands  are  not  standing  still.  We  misjudge 
them  if  we  regard  them  as  unaffected  by  the  same  ideals 
and  hopes  which  animate  us.  It  is  true  that  there  have 
been  many  revolutions  and  that  lands  like  Colombia  and 
Ecuador  can  remember  greater  and  freer  days  than  they 
know  now.  But,  as  Lord  Bryce  says :  "Argentina  is  now, 
like  Chile,  a  constitutional  republic,  whose  defects,  what- 
ever they  may  be,  are  the  defects  of  a  republic,  not  of  a 
despotism  disguised  under  republican  forms.  The  ex- 
amples of  these  two  countries  prove  that  there  is  nothing 
in  South  American  air  or  Spanish  blood  to  prevent  re- 
publican institutions  from  working.  If  the  working  is 
not  perfect,  neither  is  it  perfect  anywhere  else  in  the 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress ,  159-163. 


30          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

world.  .  .  .  Taking  the  eleven  South  American  states 
as  a  whole,  their  condition  is  better  than  it  was  sixty 
years  ago.  .  .  .  Their  difficulties  were  greater  than  any 
European  people  had  to  face,  and  there  is  no  need  to  be 
despondent  for  their  future/'1 

Our  Duty.  The  Panama  Canal  is  a  sign  and  a  pledge 
of  our  unity  with  Latin  America.  The  motto  of  the 
Canal  Zone  is  "The  Land  Divided,  the  World  United," 
and  that  motto  has  its  deep  moral  significance.  If  the 
canal  is  thought  of  simply  as  an  agency  of  gain  and 
advantage  to  the  United  States  and  as  necessitating  the 
extension  of  our  sovereignty  over  adjoining  territories 
it  will  increase  the  suspicion  and  fear  which  Latin 
America  already  feels.  If  it  is  thought  of  as  our  con- 
tribution to  the  welfare  and  unity  of  all  the  American 
nations,  as  a  means  of  common  enrichment,  and  as  a  bond 
of  friendship  and  understanding,  we  may  go  forward 
into  a  new  day. 

It  must  be  a  day  of  acquaintance.  As  Sr.  Pezet  has 
said:  "No  man  can  truly  appreciate  another  if  he  does 
not  know  him.  No  nation  can  feel  friendship  toward 
another  if  it  does  not  know  it.  But  to  know  should  imply 
understanding,  without  which  there  can  be  nothing  in 
common,  and  understanding  is  essential  to  draw  in- 
dividuals together,  and  this  is  also  true  of  nations.  .  .  . 

"Therefore,  if  such  peoples  wish  to  become  friendly, 
they  must  begin  by  knowing  each  other,  becoming  ac- 
quainted through  intercourse,  and  thus  discover  their 
respective  traits  and  characteristics,  so  that,  in  course  of 
time,  a  sentiment  of  understanding  is  born,  which,  being 


1  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  545,  548,  551. 


POLITICAL  31 

reciprocal,  eventually  gives  way  to  friendship,  and,  in 
like  manner,  to  amity  between  nations."1 

It  must  be  a  day  of  service.  We  can  begin  with  the 
thousand  Latin-American  students  now  in  the  colleges 
and  universities  of  the  United  States  and  we  must  go  out 
into  all  the  Latin-American  lands.  There  are  in  these 
lands,  as  the  Commission  on  Survey  and  Occupation 
said  at  Panama,  "all  the  conditions  maturing  for  great 
movements  and  consequences.  Crowded  populations 
made  aware  of  productive,  unoccupied  lands  tend  to 
migrate.  The  progressive  stabilization  of  the  govern- 
ments calls  forth  capital  formerly  reluctant.  Railroads 
throw  open  regions  hitherto  inaccessible  and  idle.  The 
advance  of  scientific  sanitation  renders  the  old  cities  and 
new  territories  safely  habitable.  Education  overtaking 
illiteracy  turns  the  weakness  of  nations  into  strength, 
raising  reciprocally  the  ambitions,  the  productivity,  and 
the  economic  consumption  of  millions.  The  resulting 
civilization,  like  that  of  the  North,  will  be  a  congeries  of 
many  peoples  and  races  with  variety,  yet  essential  unity. 
This  civilization,  fronting  East  and  West,  reaching  out 
to  all  the  continents,  is  veritably  seated  at  a  cross-roads 
of  the  world.  Nations,  like  individuals,  cannot  mingle 
in  the  markets  and  exchanges,  sit  together  in  world 
councils,  learn  one  another's  languages,  interblend  their 
stock,  without  sharing  ideas,  ideals,  and  institutions. 
The  people  of  Latin  America,  for  their  own  sake,  are 
eminently  worthy  to  receive  the  maximum  ministry  Chris- 
tianity has  to  offer.  The  multiplying  and  strengthening 
relations  binding  them  to  all  the  world  render  imperative 

1  "Contrast  in  the  Development  of  Nationality  in  Anglo- 
America  and  Latin  America,"  3. 


32          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

and  fitting  their  inclusion  and  identification  with  what- 
ever forces  are  joining  efforts  for  the  establishment  of 
the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth."1 

The  Latin  Americans  and  ourselves  are  neighbors  on 
these  two  continents  by  the  will  of  God.  They  are  not 
we,  and  we  are  not  they.  God  might  have  ordered  that 
all  this  Western  world  should  be  theirs  or  ours.  He 
set  us  both  here  with  our  diverse  racial  inheritance  and 
political,  educational,  and  national  spirit  and  character, 
separated  by  wide  and  deep  divergencies  which  have  pro- 
duced distrust  and  suspicion  and  mis  judgments.  But  his 
will  is  a  will  of  concord  and  unity,  not  of  strife  and  dis- 
sension, and  the  various  gifts  of  the  diverse  races  are 
all  meant  for  his  use  and  are  to  be  brought  into  his  king- 
dom. More  powerful,  accordingly,  than  all  the  elements 
of  dissension  are  his  purposes  of  brotherhood  and  the 
forces  by  which  all  of  the  peoples  of  these  Western  con- 
tinents are  being  educated  for  a  common  service.  Our 
similar  equipment  of  natural  resources,  our  kindred  prob- 
lems in  mastering  nature  and  in  creating  honest,  gener- 
ous, and  purified  societies,  and  our  common  duty  to  God 
and  the  world,  mark  out  before  us  a  common  way.  To- 
gether we  need  to  seek  and  to  tread  that  way,  to  offer  and 
to  accept  all  brotherly  help,  to  sympathize  and  to  under- 
stand and  to  trust,  and  to  build  in  simple  purpose  and 
in  sincere  faith  the  enduring  house  of  the  commonwealth 
of  God. 

Report  of  Commission  I  on  Survey  and  Occupation,  87. 


II 

COMMERCIAL 

Latin  America's  Handicap.  In  trade  and  industry 
as  in  politics,  the  Latin- American  nations  have  an  inherit- 
ance to  reckon  with.  The  Manifesto  "Addressed  to  all 
nations  of  the  earth  by  the  General  Constituent  Congress 
of  the  United  Provinces  of  South  America,  respecting 
the  treatment  and  cruelties  they  have  experienced  from 
the  Spaniards,  and  which  have  given  rise  to  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence,"  adopted  at  Buenos  Aires,  October 
25,  1817,  sets  forth  in  the  wholesale  style  of  such  docu- 
ments some  of  the  commercial  injustices  which  the 
Latin-American  peoples  suffered.  "The  Spaniards," 
declared  these  sons  of  Spain  who  had  breathed  the 
air  of  American  freedom,  "placed  a  barrier  to  the  popu- 
lation of  the  country.  They  prohibited,  under  laws  the 
most  rigorous,  the  ingress  of  foreigners,  and  in  every  pos- 
sible respect  limited  that  of  even  Spaniards  themselves, 
although  in  times  more  recent  the  emigration  of 
criminal  and  immoral  men,  outcasts,  was  encouraged, 
of  men  such  as  it  was  expedient  to  expel  from  the 
Peninsula.  .  .  . 

"Hundreds  of  leagues  do  we  still  behold,  unsettled  and 
uncultivated,  in  the  space  intervening  from  one  city 
to  another.  Entire  towns  have,  in  some  places,  dis- 
appeared, either  buried  in  the  ruins  of  mines,  or  their 
inhabitants  destroyed  by  the  compulsive  and  poisonous 

33 


34          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

labor  of  working  them;  nor  have  the  cries  of  all  Peru, 
nor  the  energetic  remonstrances  of  the  most  zealous  minis- 
ters, been  capable  of  reforming  this  exterminating  sys- 
tem of  forced  labor,  carried  on  within  the  bowels  of  the 
earth.  .  .  . 

"Commerce  has  at  all  times  been  an  exclusive  monopoly 
in  the  hands  of  the  traders  of  Spain  and  the  consignees 
they  sent  over  to  America.  .  .  .  She  carried  on  an  ex- 
clusive trade  because  she  supposed  opulence  would  make 
us  proud  and  inclined  to  free  ourselves  from  outrage. 
She  denied  to  us  the  advancement  of  industry  in  order 
that  we  might  be  divested  of  the  means  of  rising  out  of 
misery  and  poverty ;  and  we  were  excluded  from  offices 
of  trust  in  order  that  Peninsulars  only  might  hold  influ- 
ence in  the  country,  and  form  the  necessary  habits  and 
inclinations,  with  a  view  of  leaving  us  in  such  a  state 
of  dependence  as  to  be  unable  to  think  or  act,  unless 
according  to  Spanish  forms."1 

The  picture  is  doubtless  of  deeper  shade  because  of 
the  earnestness  of  the  men  who  drew  it,  but  it  is  not 
surprising  that  they  set  forth  the  facts  bitterly. 

Modern  Financial  History.  And  the  more  modern 
commercial  development  of  Latin  America  has  had  un- 
happy features  also.  Sr.  Calderon  sets  forth  the  eco- 
nomic problems  with  criticism  as  competent  and  unspar- 
ing as  that  which  he  applies  to  the  political  conditions : 
"Unexploited  wealth  abounds  in  America.  ...  By 
means  of  long-sustained  efforts,  an  active  race  would 
have  won  financial  independence.  The  Latin  Amer- 
icans, idle,  and  accustomed  to  leave  everything  to  the 


aHezekiah  Butterworth,  South  America,  72-77* 


COMMERCIAL  35 

initiative  of  the  state,  have  been  unable  to  effect  the 
conquest  of  the  soil,  and  it  is  foreign  capital  that  exploits 
the  treasure  of  America.  .  .  .  Loans  accumulated,  and 
very  soon  various  states  were  obliged  to  solicit  the  simul- 
taneous reduction  of  the  capital  borrowed  and  the  rate 
of  interest  paid.  The  lamentable  history  of  these 
bankrupt  democracies  dates  from  this  period.  Little  by 
little  these  financial  contracts  lost  all  semblance  of  serious 
business.  In  the  impossibility  of  obtaining  really  solid 
guaranties  the  bankers  imposed  preposterous  conditions, 
and  issue  at  a  discount  became  the  rule  with  the  new 
conventions.  A  series  of  interventions  in  Buenos  Aires, 
Mexico,  Santo  Domingo,  and  Venezuela,  diplomatic  con- 
flicts, and  claims  for  indemnity  resulted  from  this  pre- 
carious procedure.  Moreover,  thanks  to  the  protection' 
accorded  by  their  respective  countries,  foreigners  ac- 
quired a  privileged  position.  The  Americans  were  sub- 
jected to  the  jurisdiction  of  the  ordinary  courts,  before 
which  they  could  demand  the  payment  of  their  claims  on 
the  state;  foreigners  enjoyed  exceptional  treatment.  A 
statute  was  enacted  in  their  favor,  and  their  govern- 
ments supported  them  in  the  recovery  of  unjustifiable 
claims.  Sir  Charles  Wyke,  English  minister  to  Mexico, 
wrote  to  the  Foreign  Office  in  1862:  'Nineteen  out  of 
twenty  foreigners  who  reside  in  this  unfortunate  coun- 
try have  some  claim  against  the  government  in  one  way 
or  another.  Many  of  these  claims  are  really  based  on 
the  denial  of  real  justice,  while  others  have  been  fabri- 
cated throughout,  as  a  good  speculation,  which  would 
enable  the  claimant  to  obtain  money  for  some  imaginary 
wrong;  for  example,  three  days'  imprisonment  which 
was  intentionally  provoked  with  the  object  of  formulat- 


36          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

ing  a  claim  which  might  be  pushed  to  an  exorbitant 
figure/ 

"In  face  of  the  string  of  debts  which  arose  from  the 
loans  themselves,  or  from  claims  for  damages  suffered 
during  the  civil  wars,  the  governments  could  only  suc- 
cumb. The  immorality  of  the  fiscal  agents  and  the 
greed  of  the  foreigner  will  explain  these  continual  bank- 
ruptcies, which  constitute  the  financial  history  of  Amer- 
ica. .  .  . 

"On  the  one  hand  the  budget  is  loaded  to  create  new 
employments  in  order  to  assuage  the  national  appetite 
for  sinecures,  while  the  protective  tariffs  are  raised  to 
enrich  the  state.  Thus  the  forces  of  production  dis- 
appear, life  becomes  dearer,  and  poverty  can  only  in- 
crease. America  has  until  lately  known  little  of  pro- 
ductive loans  intended  for  use  in  the  construction  of 
railways,  irrigation  works,  harbors,  or  for  the  organiza- 
tion of  colonies  of  immigrants. 

"The  product  of  the  customs  and  other  fiscal  dues 
is  not  enough  to  stimulate  the  material  progress  of  a 
nation.  So  application  is  made  to  the  bankers  of  London 
or  Paris ;  but  it  is  the  very  excess  of  these  loan  operations 
and  the  bad  employment  of  the  funds  obtained  that  im- 
poverishes the  continent.  .  .  . 

"The  budgets  of  various  states  complicate  still  further 
a  situation  already  difficult.  They  increase  beyond  all 
measure,  without  the  slightest  relation  to  the  progress 
made  by  the  nation.  They  are  based  upon  taxes  which 
are  one  of  the  causes  of  the  national  impoverishment, 
or  upon  a  protectionist  tariff  which  adds  greatly  to  the 
cost  of  life.  The  politicians,  thinking  chiefly  of  appear- 
ances, neglect  the  development  of  the  national  resources 


COMMERCIAL  37 

for  the  immediate  augmentation  of  the  fiscal  revenues; 
thanks  to  fresh  taxes,  the  budgets  increase.  These  re- 
sources are  not  employed  in  furthering  profitable  under- 
takings, such  as  building  railroads  or  highways,  or  in- 
creasing the  navigability  of  the  rivers.  The  bureaucracy 
is  increased  in  a  like  proportion,  and  the  budgets,  swelled 
in  order  to  dupe  the  outside  world,  serve  only  to  support 
a  nest  of  parasites.  .  .  . 

"To  sum  up,  the  new  continent,  politically  free,  is 
economically  a  vassal.  This  dependence  is  inevitable; 
without  European  capital  there  would  have  been  no 
railways,  no  ports,  and  no  stable  government  in  Amer- 
ica. But  the  disorder  which  prevails  in  the  finances 
of  the  country  changes  into  a  real  servitude  what  might 
otherwise  have  been  a  beneficial  relation.  By  the  ac- 
cumulation of  loans  frequent  crises  are  provoked,  and 
frequent  occasions  of  foreign  intervention/' 

And  yet  Sr.  Calderon  closes  with  this  hopeful  view: 
"Latin  America  may  already  be  considered  as  independ- 
ent from  the  agricultural  point  of  view ;  it  possesses  riches 
which  are  peculiar  to  it:  coffee  to  Brazil,  wheat  to  the 
Argentine,  sugar  to  Peru,  fruits  and  rubber  to  the  tropics. 
Its  productive  capacity  is  considerable.  It  may  rule  the 
markets  of  the  world.  The  systematic  exploitation  of  its 
mines  will  reveal  treasures  which  are  not  even  suspected. 
We  may  say,  then,  that  even  without  great  industries  the 
American  continent,  independent  in  the  agricultural 
domain,  and  an  exporter  of  precious  metals,  may  win  a 
doubtless  precarious  economic  liberty."1 

Area.     South  America,  both  in  its  physical  geogra- 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  378-382,  386. 


38          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

phy  and  in  its  people,  presents  vivid  contrasts  with  our 
own  continent.  The  two  continents  do  not  vary  greatly 
in  size.  The  areas  of  North  America  and  South  Amer- 
ica, according  to  the  figures  of  the  Pan-American  Union, 
are  8,559,000  and  7,598,000  square  miles  respectively. 
But  the  two  continents  are  of  strikingly  different  con- 
figuration, and  in  the  matter  of  river  systems  South 
America  is  more  richly  equipped  than  any  other  con- 
tinent. This  water  system  renders  the  development  of 
interior  South  America  far  simpler  than  the  development 
of  interior  Africa.  It  can  be  made  to  do  for  these 
republics  what  China's  water  system,  much  of  it  artificial, 
has  done  for  China. 

We  can  best  appreciate  the  greatness  of  these  South 
American  nations  by  comparing  them  with  our  own 
states.  Brazil  exceeds  the  whole  United  States  in  size 
by  an  area  of  200,000  square  miles,  or  four  times  the 
state  of  New  York. 

"In  Argentina,  located  in  the  south  temperate  zone, 
with  a  climate  like  that  of  the  United  States,  could  be 
placed  all  that  part  of  our  country  east  of  the  Mississippi 
River  plus  the  first  tier  of  states  west  of  it. 

"Bolivia  is  comfortably  half  a  dozen  times  larger  than 
the  combined  area  of  New.  York,  New  Jersey,  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  Delaware. 

"Into  Chile  could  be  put  four  Nebraskas. 

"Peru  would  obscure,  if  placed  over  them  on  the  map, 
California,  Oregon,  Washington,  Nevada,  Arizona,  Utah, 
and  Idaho. 

"Paraguay  is  only  four  times  bigger  than  the  state  of 
Indiana,  while  little  Uruguay  could  wrap  within  its 
limits  North  Dakota. 


COMMERCIAL  39 

"Texas  could  be  lost  twice  in  Venezuela  and  still  leave 
room  for  Kentucky  and  Tennessee. 

"On  the  globe,  Ecuador  does  not  spread  like  a  giant, 
but  it  could  hold  all  New  England,  New  York,  and 
New  Jersey. 

"Finally,  there  is  Colombia,  a  land  of  splendid  promise 
and  mighty  resources,  whose  nearest  port  is  only  950 
miles  from  the  nearest  port  of  the  United  States.  This 
republic  has  an  area  as  great  as  that  of  Germany,  France, 
Holland,  and  Belgium  combined."1 

Population,  The  population  of  South  America  is 
less  than  one  half  of  that  of  North  America.  North 
America  has  about  136,000,000  people,  of  whom  less  than 
100,000,000  are  white,  and  South  America  has  approxi- 
mately 55,000,000  inhabitants,  of  whom  less  than  20,000,- 
ooo  are  of  pure  white  blood.  South  America  is  more 
thinly  settled,  with  the  population  scattered  over  an 
immense  area,  than  any  other  part  of  the  world.  Its 
population  has  grown  less  rapidly  than  that  of  any 
other  portion  of  the  world  unless  it  is  Africa. 

The  80,000,000  of  Latin  Americans  can  be  roughly 
divided  into  the  following  racial  groups : 

Whites   18,000,000 

Indians   17,000,000 

.  Negroes 6,000,000 

Mixed  White  and  Indian 30,000,000 

Mixed  White  and  Negro 8,000,000 

Mixed  Negro  and  Indian 700,000 

East  Indian,  Japanese,  and  Chinese 300,000 


80,000,000 
The  population  per  square  mile  of  some  of  the  differ- 


^John  Barrett,  "Latin  America,  the  Land  of  Opportunity,"  28. 


40          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

ent  countries  of  the  world  will  show  the  opportunity  for 
development  in  South  America.  The  following  figures 
are  based  on  statistics  published  in  the  Statesman's 
Year  Book  and  the  World  Almanac.  They  are  for  the 
most  part  for  the  years  1914,  1915,  or  1916,  but  allow- 
ance should  be  made  for  the  fact  that  areas  and  popula- 
tions of  many  of  the  countries  now  at  war  have  varied 
greatly  in  the  past  two  years. 

Belgium   652  Mexico   19 

England  and  Wales 633  Chile  12 

Japan 364  Brazil    7.3 

France    189  Argentina    6.9 

Guatemala   43  Peru   6.6 

United  States 34  Bolivia   3.4 

Natural  Resources.  It  is  customary  to  speak  with 
unlimited  wonder  of  the  wealth  and  resources  of  South 
America.  It  is  not  to  be  doubted  that  the  continent  has 
immense  riches  of  agricultural  product  and  mineral 
treasure  waiting  to  be  developed,  but  the  general  im- 
pression produced  upon  the  observant  visitor  is  disap- 
pointing. There  are  deserts  more  barren  than  the  worst 
of  ours.  The  tropical  forests  and  vegetation  are  coarse 
and  oppressive.  The  rain  and  warmth  produce  luxuriant 
growths,  but  tender  things,  green  grass,  and  little  flowers 
die  in  the  shadows  or  are  scorched  in  the  heat.  The 
table-lands  of  the  Andes  above  the  timber  line  and  with 
too  high  an  altitude  for  corn  or  wheat,  the  rainless 
stretches  of  arid  soil,  the  sandy  wastes  even  in  the 
tropics,  the  swamps  and  miasmic  forests  must  all  be 
measured  when  we  talk  of  the  agricultural  possibilities 
of  South  America.  The  great  broken  ranges  of  the 
Andes  make  many  of  the  mineral  resources  almost  in- 


COMMERCIAL  41 

accessible  and  the  engineering  problems  involved  in 
railways  are  far  more  difficult  than  with  us. 

This  is  an  overconservative  way  of  stating  the  case. 
A  much  brighter  view  is  possible.  The  Report  of  the 
Panama  Congress  Commission  on  Survey  and  Occupa- 
tion gives  it  to  us : 

"Here  are  vast  quantities  of  raw  material  with  which 
to  supply  the  world.  Latin  America  has  large  areas 
to  be  eliminated  from  this  reckoning.  .  .  .  But  on  the 
whole  it  is  apparent  that  most  of  the  agricultural  soil 
has  been  little  used  where  broken  at  all,  while  the  mining 
resources  have  been  scarcely  touched.  As  soon  as  the 
countries  are  more  adequately  settled  and  scientifically 
developed,  raw  materials  will  pour  forth  in  tremendous 
volume.  The  fertility  of  enormous  sections  in  Brazil, 
Uruguay,  Argentina,  Colombia,  Chile,  Central  America, 
Mexico,  Cuba,  and  Porto  Rico  cannot  be  surpassed  any- 
where in  the  world.  The  habitable,  cultivable  area  south 
of  the  United  States  exceeds  that  of  the  remaining  por- 
tion of  the  western  hemisphere.  It  extends  from  the 
north  temperate  zone  to  Cape  Horn,  and  hence  has  all 
the  climatic  conditions  from  tropical  heat  to  arctic  cold. 
All  the  varied  products  of  the  entire  globe  can  be  culti- 
vated."1 

A  land  like  Argentina  justifies  such  a  view.  Already 
the  foreign  exports  of  the  Argentine  far  exceed  the 
exports  of  all  the  rest  of  South  America  combined,  ex- 
cepting Brazil.  As  a  commercial  country  it  rivals  Canada 
and  outranks  Japan,  China,  Mexico,  Australia,  and 
Spain.  The  country  is  still  thinly  settled,  about  7  to  the 


^Report  of  Commission  I  to  the  Panama  Congress,  12. 


42  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

square  mile  as  compared  with  34  in  the  United  States 
and  633  in  England,  and  its  agricultural  resources  are 
only  on  the  threshold  of  development.  There  are  21,- 
ooo  miles  of  railroad  as  compared  with  15,272  in  Brazil, 
with  new  lines  building  in  both  countries. 

"The  producing  capacity  of  the  country  is  steadily 
increasing,  and  in  cereal  production  its  status  is  evidenced 
by  the  fact  that  as  a  corn  exporter  the  Argentine  Re- 
public took  first  rank  in  1908,  occupying  the  place 
formerly  held  by  the  United  States.  In  the  production 
of  this  foodstuff  the  country  ranks  third,  and  as  a  wheat 
grower  fifth.  It  is  first  as  an  exporter  of  frozen  meat 
and  second  as  a  shipper  of  wool. 

"In  the  number  of  its  cattle  the  republic  holds  third 
place  among  the  nations,  being  ranked  with  India  and 
the  United  States.  Russia  and  the  United  States  exceed 
it  in  the  number  of  horses,  and  Australia  alone  has  a 
greater  number  of  sheep."1 

The  facts  for  the  rest  of  Latin  America  are  well 
summarized  in  the  Panama  Congress  Report: 

"Brazil  is  also  an  agricultural  country,  producing 
sugar,  cotton,  tobacco,  timber,  rubber,  cocoa,  and  nuts. 
At  least  two  thirds  of  the  world's  coffee  supply  and 
one  third  of  the  crude  rubber  come  from  Brazil.  In 
1913  it  had  about  70,000,000  head  of  cattle,  pigs,  sheep, 
horses,  and  mules.  The  state  of  Pernambuco  has  forty- 
seven  sugar  factories.  Brazilian  foreign  commerce, 
amounting  in  1913  to  about  $641,000,000,  is  still  in  its 
infancy.  The  imports  in  1913  exceeded  the  exports,  but 
in  the  ten  years  previous  to  1913  the  excess  of  exports 


"The  Argentine  Republic,  1909,"  11,  15,  17,  18. 


COMMERCIAL  43 

over  imports  amounted  to  $768,000,000.  The  country 
offers  a  great  market  for  hardware,  implements,  and 
clothing.  The  mining  territory  has  been  only  partially 
explored.  Agricultural  possibilities  are  enormous.  States 
like  Sao  Paulo  are  proceeding  to  realize  them.  Virgin 
forests  are  full  of  rosewood  and  of  other  valuable  hard- 
woods. The  potential  'white  coal'  in  the  mighty  Brazil- 
ian rivers  as  they  drop  from  the  plateaus  is  incalculable. 
The  development  of  a  single  light  and  power  company 
represents  millions  of  dollars  of  capital. 

"The  total  area  of  Chile's  agricultural  land,  most  of 
which  must  be  irrigated,  is  95,000,000  acres,  but  less  than 
2,000,000  acres  are  under  cultivation.  There  are  also 
nearly  40,000,000  acres  of  forest'land  which  when  cleared 
will  become  splendid  farming  land.  The  remainder  of 
Chile  is  sterile,  but  Chile's  ready  wealth  at  present  is  in 
its  sterile  land,  because  of  its  great  nitrate  beds  and 
varied  mineral  veins.  Chile's  greatest  industry  is  the 
mining  of  nitrates.  The  value  of  this  export  alone  was 
about  $120,000,000  in  1913.  Her  foreign  commerce  for 
the  same  year  amounted  to  $270,000,000  or  about  three 
eighths  as  much  as  that  of  Japan. 

"Uruguay  is  agricultural  and  pastoral,  exporting  wool, 
wheat,  flour,  corn,  linseed,  barley,  hay,  and  tobacco.  It 
has  a  total  of  about  35,000,000  head  of  livestock.  The 
foreign  trade  in  1913  approximated  $120,000,000. 

"Paraguay  produces  a  native  tea  and  tobacco.  Bolivia 
exports  tin,  copper,  silver,  and  rubber.  She  has  extensive 
tracts  of  timber  in  the  eastern  section.  Further  agri- 
cultural development,  perhaps  remote,  will  open  up  mil- 
lions of  acres  in  the  lower  levels  of  the  interior.  Peru 
produces  gold,  silver,  copper,  cotton,  coffee,  and  sugar, 


44          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

and  is  now  beginning  to  yield  valuable  rubber,  hard- 
woods, and  medicinal  vegetable  products.  Its  foreign 
commerce  in  1913  amounted  to  $75,000,000.  Peru's 
arable  area  is  equal  to  the  combined  areas  of  Oregon, 
Washington,  Idaho,  and  California,  with  only  seven  per 
cent,  of  its  surface  under  development.  Ecuador  pro- 
duces cocoa,  Panama  hats,  ivorynuts,  coffee,  and  rice. 
Colombia  yields  coffee,  cocoa,  bananas,  rubber,  salt,  coal, 
and  iron,  and  has  probably  some  of  the  richest  mineral 
areas  in  the  world.  The  foreign  commerce  amounted 
to  about  $60,000,000  in  1913.  Venezuela  has  an  immense 
area  and  great  resources  including  mountain  forests.  It 
can  grow  a  large  variety  of  cereals,  though  its  principal 
exports  have  been  cattle,  cocoa,  rubber,  and  hides. 

"Mexico  is  well  suited  to  agriculture,  having  both  a 
temperate  and  a  tropical  climate.  Here  can  be  raised 
all  the  products  grown  in  the  United  States  and  Germany, 
as  well  as  those  grown  in  central  Africa  and  Ceylon.  It 
produces  corn,  wheat,  rubber,  and  coffee,  and  has  rich 
mining  territory  and  what  are  considered  among  the 
richest  deposits  of  petroleum  in  the  world.  The  mining 
output  has  reached  about  $90,000,000  annually.  Foreign 
commerce  before  the  recent  revolution  amounted  to 
nearly  $250,000,000  annually. 

"The  Central  American  nations  in  1913  had  a  total 
foreign  commerce  of  $85,000,000.  Cuba  gives  up  al- 
most its  entire  energies  to  the  production  of  tobacco  and 
sugar,  and  is  therefore  obliged  to  import  nearly  every- 
thing else  needed.  Her  total  foreign  commerce  in  1913 
amounted  to  $300,000,000.  Porto  Rico's  commerce  with 
the  United  States  and  foreign  countries  in  1914  reached 
nearly  $400,000,000.  The  principal  products  are  sugar, 


COMMERCIAL  45 

tobacco,  coffee,  and  fruit.  Cuba  and  Porto  Rico  will 
increasingly  supply  the  United  States  with  vegetables, 
fruits,  sugar,  and  other  table  articles.  Haiti  and  the 
Dominican  Republic  have  a  combined  foreign  trade  of 
about  $45,000,000;  while  that  of  the  British,  French,  and 
Dutch  colonies  in  Latin  America  amounts  to  about  $35,- 
ooo/xxx"1 

A  tabular  statement  will  show  the  comparative  de- 
velopment of  the  various  American  lands,  and  will  also 
indicate  the  distinction  between  the  progressive  and  back- 
ward republics  by  the  separate  grouping  of  Argentina, 
Brazil,  Chile,  and  Uruguay.  Central  America  and  the 
other  Latin  states  are  also  so  grouped.  The  following 
statistics  are  a  compilation  from  the  Bulletin  of  the  Pan- 
American  Union,  Koebel's  The  South  Americans,  the 
Statesman's  Year  Book,  the  World  Almanac,  and  the 
Foreign  Trade  Department  of  the  National  City  Bank. 

In  all  cases  the  figures  given  above  are  the  latest 
available,  varying  from  1913  to  1915  for  trade  statistics, 
and  for  populations,  in  many  cases  earlier,  on  account 
of  the  in  frequency  of  censuses.  It  should  be  remem- 
bered that  the  foreign  trade  of  practically  all  the  Latin- 
American  republics  has  undergone  a  serious  reduction 
as  a  consequence  of  the  European  war.  The  export 
trade  of  the  United  States  and  Canada  are  practically 
the  only  items  in  this  table  which  have  increased  on 
account  of  the  war,  while  in  the  case  of  every  country 
without  exception,  whose  official  statistics  are  at  hand, 
a  larger  percentage  of  its  imports  for  1915  were  drawn 
from  the  United  States  than  in  1913. 


^Report  of  Commission  I  to  the  Panama  Congress,  12,  13. 


46          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

COMPARATIVE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  AMERICAN  COUNTRIES 


Area 
(in  Thou- 
sands of 
Square 
Miles) 

Popula- 
tion 
(in 
Millions) 

Railroad 
Mileage 

Total 
Imports 
(Millions 
of 
Dollars) 

Total 
Exports 
(Millions 
of 
Dollars) 

Argentina  

1,139 

7  9 

21,000 

219 

538 

Brazil 

3,218 

24  3 

15272 

146 

257 

Chile        

291 

3  5 

5,000 

56 

117 

Uruguay 

72 

1  3 

1  600 

36 

62 

Total 

4  720 

37  0 

42  872 

457 

974 

Paraguay   . 

171 

8 

232 

2.3 

5  4 

Bolivia 

514 

2  2 

756 

7  7 

33 

Peru            

679 

4  5 

1,800 

23 

42 

.Ecuador 

116 

1  5 

365 

8 

12 

Colombia         

438 

5  5 

700 

18 

29 

Venezuela 

393 

2  6 

633 

11 

21 

British  Guiana          .    . 

89 

3 

103 

8 

13 

French  Guiana  

32 

.05 

o 

2 

1.9 

Dutch  Guiana 

46 

08 

37 

2  5 

2  5 

Total 

2  478 

17  53 

4  626 

82  5 

159  8 

Panama  

32 

.42 

202 

9.6 

5 

Costa  Rica        .  . 

23 

42 

430 

7  5 

10 

Nicaragua  

49 

5 

171 

4.0 

4.8 

Salvador 

7 

1  7 

263 

4  8 

10 

Guatemala      

48 

2  1 

502 

5.7 

11 

Honduras 

46 

6 

150 

5  9 

3  9 

British  Honduras      

8  5 

04 

25 

2  9 

2.9 

Total 

213  5 

5  78 

1,743 

40  4 

47  6 

IVlexico 

765 

15 

16,000 

94 

145 

Cuba                   

44 

2  4 

2,200 

155 

251 

Haiti  

10 

2 

70 

4 

4.2 

Santo  Domingo                     . 

19 

7 

150 

4.4 

10 

Porto  Rico    

3.6 

1.1 

220 

33 

49 

Lesser  Antilles 

13  4 

2  28 

336 

58 

58 

Total 

855  0 

23  48 

18,976 

348.4 

517  2 

United  States 

3  616 

102 

263,547 

1,778 

3,547 

Canada  &  Newfoundland  .  . 

3,892 

8.3 

31,670 

464 

629 

Argentina,  Brazil,  Chile,  and  Uruguay.  These  four 
republics  include  two  thirds  of  the  population,  but  they 
carry  on  seven  eighths  of  the  trade  of  the  continent. 
Practically  all  of  the  immigration  to  South  America  has 
been  to  these  four  countries,  and  it  is  not  without  shame 
that  we  note  that  the  parts  of  South  America  farthest 


COMMERCIAL  47 

from  the  United  States  are  the  most  prosperous  parts. 
Europe  has  done  far  more  to  develop  South  American 
trade  and  resources  than  we  have  done,  and  the  best 
life  of  South  America  to-day  is  the  life  which  has  been 
most  touched  by  northern  European  influence. 

The  total  population  of  South  America  is  about 
55,000,000,  its  exports  in  1915  were  about  $i,  134,000,000 
gold,  and  its  imports  about  $540,000,000.  The  great 
excess  of  exports  over  imports  would  be  a  good  sign  but 
for  the  fact  that  a  great  deal  of  the  capital  engaged  in 
producing  the  exports  is  foreign  capital  and  that  the 
earnings  of  this  capital  go  out  of  the  country.  The  same 
thing  is  true  of  most  of  the  railway  earnings.  If  it  were 
not  for  Brazil  and  Argentina  and  Chile,  these  immense 
territories  would  show  a  commerce  less  than  Denmark's 
alone.  Even  poor  Persia  has  an  export  and  import  trade 
exceeding  that  of  Paraguay,  Ecuador,  and  Colombia. 
There  are  great  resources  in  South  America,  but  they  are 
not  easily  developed.  The  local  populations  are  incom- 
petent to  develop  them.  Commercially,  the  continent  is 
dependent  upon  energy  and  capital  from  without.  When 
these  are  introduced,  however,  what  has  already  been 
done  in  Argentina  and  Brazil  shows  what  may  be  ex- 
pected in  the  development  of  South  American  resources. 

The  total  foreign  trade1  (in  millions  of  dollars)  of  the 
four  republics  commonly  grouped  together  as  the  ad- 
vanced states,  has  grown  in  the  period  1894-1915  as 
follows : 

Argentina    from 194  to  757 

Brazil    from 217  to  4o3 

Chile    from 1 18  to  17, 

Uruguay    from 61  to 


Koebel,  The  South  Americans,  358. 


48          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

In  every  case  both  the  imports  and  exports  of  these 
countries  have  shown  a  decided  falling  off  in  the  period 
since  the  beginning  of  the  European  war.  Yet  the  amaz- 
ing per  capita  trade  of  Argentina  and  Uruguay  is  still 
from  40  to  80  per  cent,  greater  than  that  of  the  United 
States.  Brazil,  with  a  population  of  24,000,000,  exports 
as  much  as  China,  with  a  population  of  more  than  320,- 
000,000.  Argentina,  with  a  population  of  7,000,000,  has 
exports  and  imports  exceeding  by  $140,000,000  the  total 
exports  and  imports  of  Japan,  with  a  population  seven 
times  that  of  the  Argentine.  The  exports  of  Brazil  and 
Argentina  combined,  with  a  population  of  31,000,000, 
exceed  by  $180,000,000  the  combined  exports  of  Japan 
and  China,  with  a  population  of  380,000,000,  twelve 
times  the  combined  population  of  Brazil  and  the  Argen- 
tine. In  proportion,  Chile  far  exceeds  in  her  foreign 
trade  both  Japan  and  China.  If  Japan  exported  as  much 
in  proportion  to  her  population  as  Chile  does,  Japan's 
exports  would  amount  not  to  $353,000,000,  but  to  more 
than  $2,400,000,000,  while  China's  would  amount,  not  to 
$260,000,000,  but  to  more  than  $10,000,000,000!  From 
such  facts  one  may  gain  some  impression  of  the  un- 
developed trade  of  the  Far  East,  especially  when  he 
reminds  himself  that  the  trade  of  South  America  is  only 
beginning. 

R  is  in  large  part  because  of  the  woeful  undevelop- 
ment  of  indigenous  manufacture  that  the  imports  of 
South  America  are  so  great.  She  exports  agricultural 
and  mineral  products  and  imports  all  else,  and  some  of 
the  South  American  countries  have  to  import  foodstuffs 
also,  although  there  is  not  one  of  them  that  could  not 
amply  supply  a  population  many  times  as  great  as  its  own. 


COMMERCIAL  49 

Inter-American  Trade.  One  of  the  greatest  trade 
opportunities  of  the  United  States  is  in  Latin  America. 
In  the  first  eight  months  of  the  government  fiscal  year 
1909-10  our  exports  to  Asia  were  $72,000,000,  a  loss 
of  $2,000,000  as  compared  with  the  preceding  year, 
while  our  trade  with  the  rest  of  the  western  hemisphere 
was  $300,000,000,  a  gain  of  $60,000,000.  Our  trade  with 
Porto  Rico  was  greater  than  our  trade  with  either  China 
or  Japan,  and  our  trade  with  Cuba  exceeded  our  trade 
with  China  and  Japan  combined.  In  1899,  our  exports 
to  South  America  were  $15,000,000  less  than  to  Asia, 
but  in  1909  they  were  $10,000,000  greater.  The  Hon. 
John  Barrett  has  stated  vividly  the  facts  as  to  the  extent 
of  South  America's  trade  and  our  inadequate  but  in- 
creasing share  in  it. 

"The  latest  data  compiled  in  the  Pan-American  Union 
disclose  the  imposing  fact  that  the  twenty  Latin-Amer- 
ican countries  of  North  America  and  South  America 
conducted,  in  1913,  a  foreign  commerce  valued  at  the 
vast  total  of  $2,843,178,575,  or  nearly  $3,000,000,000. 
Of  this  amount  they  imported  products  valued  at  $i,- 
304,261,763.  Of  this  total,  in  turn,  there  came  from 
Great  Britain  products  valued  at  $322,036,347;  from 
Germany,  $216,010,418;  from  France,  $103,220,223; 
from  Italy,  $55,494,413;  from  Belgium,  $48,747,164; 
from  Austria-Hungary,  $9,026,478;  from  the  Nether- 
lands, $8,293,859;  from  Switzerland,  $6,189,050;  and 
from  all  other  countries,  excepting  the  United  States, 
$217,920,517.  .  .  .  The  United  States  supplied  pro- 
ducts valued  at  $317,323,294.  This  means  that  Latin 
America  in  1913  bought  from  countries  other  than  the 
United  States  imports  valued  at  $986,938,469,  and  that 


So          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

of  this  total  approximately  $718,000,000  came  from 
countries  now  engaged  in  a  great  war,  the  manufactur- 
ing, exporting,  and  financial  facilities  of  which  are  to- 
day either  paralyzed  or  greatly  lessened  in  efficiency  of 
operation  and  production. 

"Considering  next  the  exports  of  Latin  America,  we 
have  an  even  greater  field  of  mingled  responsibility  and 
opportunity  for  the  legitimate  activity  of  the  United 
States.  It  would  be  selfish  indeed  and  cold-blooded  in 
such  a  crisis  for  the  business  interests  of  the  United 
States  to  think  only  of  selling  to  Latin  America  and  not 
of  buying  from  her  so  as  to  provide  a  market  for  her 
accumulating  raw  products  and  other  exports  that  usu- 
ally go  to  Europe.  Fair  exchange  is  no  robbery,  and 
in  this  unique  situation  it  may  develop  comity  and  confi- 
dence as  well  as  commerce.  All  Latin  America,  in  1913, 
exported  products  valued  at  $1,538,916,812.  Of  this 
total  the  share  of  Great  Britain  was  $316,419,914;  Ger- 
many, $192,394,702;  France,  $120,907,415;  Belgium, 
$62,557,566;  Netherlands,  $43,277,631;  Italy,  $27,964,- 
ooi ;  Austria-Hungary,  $23,294,991 ;  and  all  other  coun- 
tries, excepting  the  United  States,  $247,722,380.  .  .  .  The 
share  of  the  United  States  in  the  exports  of  Latin  Amer- 
ica was  larger  than  that  of  any  other  country  and 
amounted  to  $504,378,212.  While  it  may  surprise  the 
average  man  that  the  United  States  buys  to  this  extent 
from  Latin  America,  he  must  not  forget  that  there  re- 
mained the  large  total  of  $1,034,538,600  purchased  by 
other  countries.  Of  this  big  total,  $715,474,588  were 
bought  by  those  lands  which  are  at  present  engaged  in 
desperate  warfare.  If  then  in  some  way  the  United 
States  can  enlarge  its  purchases  from  Latin  America  it 


COMMERCIAL  51 

will  greatly  aid  in  reducing  the  unproductive  congestion 
and  relieving  the  financial  strain  that  must  otherwise 
characterize  the  principal  exporting  centers  of  Latin 
America."1 

The  course  of  trade  has  turned  now  from  Europe  to 
the  United  States,  and  is  gaining  steadily.  In  the  four 
years,  1909  to  1912,  our  trade  with  South  America  in- 
creased from  $277,000,000  to  $373,000,000. 

Exports  from  the  United  States  increased  during  the 
four  years,  to  Chile  140  per  cent.;  to  Venezuela,  116  per 
cent. ;  to  Brazil,  104  per  cent. ;  to  Colombia,  94  per  cent. ; 
to  Uruguay,  82  per  cent.;  to  Argentina,  41  per  cent.; 
and  to  Peru,  36  per  cent. 

In  dollars  the  trade  to  Brazil  shows  the  largest  in- 
crease, having  jumped  from  $20,000,000  in  1909,  to 
$41,000,000  in  1912.  In  Argentina  it  increased  from 
$36,000,000  to  $51,000,000;  in  Chile  from  $7,000,000  to 
$15,000,000;  and  in  Venezuela  from  $2,500,000  to  $5,- 
700,000. 

"Imports  from  these  countries  increased  to  much 
larger  totals,  but  not  in  as  great  proportion  as  the  ex- 
ports to  them.  From  Brazil  this  country  imported  in 
1909  goods  valued  at  $134,000,000  and  in  1912  at  $173,- 
000,000;  from  Argentina,  $64,000,000  and  $85,000,000; 
from  Chile,  $23,000,000  and  $38,000,000 ;  from  Colombia, 
$12,000,000  and  $21,000,000;  and  from  Venezuela,  $10,- 
000,000  and  $i7,cxx),ooo."2 

In  January,  1916,  our  exports  to  South  America  were 
more  than  double  those  of  January,  1915,  and  for  the 
seven  months  ending  with  January,  1916,  were  more 

Barrett,  "The  Pan-American  Era,"  3,  5. 
2  Boston  Herald,  March  3,  1913. 


52  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

than  double  those  for  the  corresponding  months  preced- 
ing. The  "General  Survey  of  Latin- American  Trade  in 
1913,"  published  by  the  Pan- American  Union,  declares: 

"The  United  States  controls  nearly  three  tenths  of  all 
Latin-American  trade.  This  is  over  one  third  to  one 
half  more  than  that  controlled  by  its  nearest  rival,  the 
United  Kingdom,  and  double  or  more  than  double  the 
proportion  of  Germany.  To  many  Americans  this  state- 
ment sometimes  causes  surprise.  .  .  . 

"In  the  northern  group  of  states,  Mexico,  Central 
America,  Cuba,  Haiti,  and  the  Dominican  Republic,  to 
which  are  added  Venezuela  and  Colombia  in  South  Amer- 
ica, the  United  States  controls  about  60  per  cent,  of  the 
whole  trade  of  these  twelve  countries,  as  is  shown  by 
the  following  table: 

1913                           Imports  Exports  Total 

Total    trade $350,697,079  $455,051,491  $795,748,570 

Share  of  the  United  States,      174,419,399  300,549,379  474,968,778 

Per  cent,  of  the  United  States,      49.7               67.5  59.6 

"In  addition  to  the  countries  mentioned,  the  United 
States  leads  in  the  total  trade  of  Ecuador,  in  Peru  it  leads 
in  imports,  and  is  a  close  second  to  the  United  Kingdom 
in  total  trade.  In  Brazil  it  has  a  commanding  lead  in 
exports,  its  takings  from  Brazil  being  more  than  twice 
that  of  any  other  two  countries.  In  the  five  countries  not 
mentioned  the  trade  of  the  United  States  ranks  below 
that  of  both  the  United  Kingdom  and  Germany. 

"For  a  number  of  years  the  United  States  has  been 
the  leading  country  in  Latin- American  exports ;  that  is, 
it  has  taken  more  of  the  products  of  these  republics  than 
has  any  other  country  of  the  world,  but  heretofore  it  has 
always  been  second  to  the  United  Kingdom  [in  imports]. 


COMMERCIAL  53 

In  1913,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  the  United  States 
led  in  Latin-American  imports  as  well  as  in  exports. 
This  is  the  most  significant  fact  to  be  derived  from  the 
study  of  the  figures  for  that  year.  So  far  from  being 
distanced  by  Europe,  the  United  States  has  in  fact  gained 
more  rapidly  than  any  of  its  rivals,  not  only  in  the  north- 
ern or  near-by  group  of  countries,  but  also  in  the  southern. 
Under  normal  conditions  and  if  the  European  war  had 
never  occurred,  everything  pointed  to  the  belief  that 
the  great  bulk  of  the  trade,  both  in  imports  and  in  ex- 
ports, for  nearly  every  one  of  the  Latin-American  coun- 
tries, would  in  a  few  years  move  north  and  south  and 
not  east  and  west"1 

Foreign  Capital.  Foreign  capital  is  absolutely 
essential  to  the  development  of  Latin  America,  and  yet 
the  introduction  of  foreign  capital  has  the  disadvantages 
referred  to  by  Sr.  Calderon.  It  introduces  the  risk  of 
political  complications.  It  is  often  wasted.  It  leaves  in 
Latin  America  wages,  permanent  improvements,  and 
accessory  benefits,  but  it  transfers  to  the  investing  lands 
the  profits  on  the  investment.  This  needs  to  be  kept  in 
mind  in  thinking  of  the  agricultural  and  mineral  pro- 
ducts of  these  lands.  We  can  easily  deceive  ourselves  as 
to  their  prosperity.  When  we  realize  the  facts  we  can 
sympathize  with  the  unreflecting  and  indiscriminate 
antagonism  to  foreign  capital  sometimes  displayed.  The 
facts  regarding  British  investments  in  South  America 
and  the  question  which  they  present  to  the  Christian 
conscience  are  set  forth  in  a  leaflet  of  the  South  Amer- 
ican Missionary  Society  of  Great  Britain  as  follows : 


^Bulletin  of  the  Pan-American  Union,  1914,  981,  982. 


54          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

"The  South  American  Journal,  after  careful  investi- 
gations, gives  the  following  as  the  present  amount  (1910) 
of  British  capital  invested  in  the  republics  of  South 
America  together  with  the  actual  figures  of  the  interest 
received  in  that  year  by  British  investors.  Bolivia  does 
not  appear  in  the  list,  there  being  no  British  capital  as 
yet  invested  there. 

Capital          Interest 

Argentina    £280,732,026    £13,206,149 

Brazil    140,246,278        6,990,292 

Chile  47,694,815        2,326,097 

Uruguay   44,691,257        1,904,088 

Peru    23,014,000          419,800 

Venezuela 7,148,109  186,434 

Colombia    5,826,976          202,103 

Ecuador    2,973,800  152,512 

Paraguay    2,814,780  49,555 

Totals    £555,142,041     £25,437,030 

"Argentina  leads  easily.  In  the  above  figures  banks 
and  shipping  are  not  included,  as  they  cannot  be  con- 
sidered as  relating  to  any  particular  country.  Nearly 
one  half  of  the  total  is  concerned  with  the  railways, 
about  one  third  is  concerned  with  the  bonds  of  the 
various  governments  and  municipalities,  the  remainder 
being  invested  in  miscellaneous  securities. 

"What  percentage  of  this  immense  annual  revenue  is 
devoted  by  its  recipients  to  the  spiritual  welfare  of  the 
lands  and  peoples  where  those  dividends  are  earned? 
Surely  those  dividends  bring  with  them  a  weighty  re- 
sponsibility/' 

Our  bankers  have  urged  larger  investments  from  the 
United  States.  And  many  Latin-American  bankers  are 
soliciting  such  investment.  An  Argentine  banker 
recently  visiting  New  York  puts  it  this  way : 


COMMERCIAL  55 

"American  traders  must  realize  that  the  powerful 
hold  Europe  has  had  in  the  past  in  Argentina  was 
through  the  money  invested  in  local  industries  and  public 
utility  companies,  which  naturally  gave  the  preference 
in  their  orders  to  the  country  to  which  their  directors 
and  shareholders  belonged.  This  circumstance  has  in 
former  years  told  against  American  trade.  The  time 
to  remedy  this  situation  has  arrived.  It  is  here  now. 

"According  to  my  calculation,  foreign  capital  in 
Argentina  amounts  to  $3,000,000,000,  of  which  almost 
half  is  invested  in  railways,  15  per  cent,  in  mortgages, 
and  the  balance  in  land,  public  utilities,  and  pastoral 
pursuits.  Much  of  this  capital  will  be  compulsorily  with- 
drawn from  Argentina,  owing  to  the  necessities  of  the 
situation.  It  is  certain  that  the  European  nations  will 
need  their  money  at  home,  while  the  heavy  war  taxes  are 
an  element  in  the  situation."1 

But  if  we  bind  more  closely  the  ties  between  Latin 
America  and  ourselves  in  this  way,  three  responsibilities 
need  to  be  remembered :  ( i )  to  invest  honestly  in  worthy 
things;  (2)  to  use  our  investments  for  the  real  economic 
advantages  of  Latin  America;  and  (3)  to  accompany 
our  investments  of  money  with  our  friendship  and  our 
moral  help. 

Taxation.  The  burden  of  taxation  in  the  South 
American  states  is  very  uneven.  In  Chile  it  is  exceed- 
ingly light,  as  we  have  seen.  In  Argentina  it  is  heavier. 
In  Buenos  Aires  there  are  imposts  upon  street-cars, 
carriages,  dogs,  theaters,  bill-boards,  billiard-halls,  tele- 
graph and  telephone  messages,  the  use  of  spaces  under 


JNew  York  Times,  April  6,  1916. 


56          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

city  streets,  on  provisions  and  wagons  conveying  them 
about  the  city,  pedlers,  hotels,  cellars,  etc.  But  in  Brazil 
the  burden  is  heaviest  of  all.  There  are  large  import 
duties,  and  the  internal  revenue  levies  are  almost  crush- 
ing to  industry.  Everything  is  taxed.  Even  the  poor 
farmer  bringing  his  goods  to  market  is  taxed  at  the  city 
gate  or  in  the  market.  Prices  in  Brazil  and  Argentina, 
accordingly,  are  higher  than  anywhere  else  in  South 
America,  and  many  forms  of  trade  are  intolerably 
burdened.  In  Brazil  especially  a  wise  and  frugal  and 
honest  political  administration  would  undoubtedly  re- 
sult in  such  an  expansion  of  industry  and  eommerce  as 
would  double  the  prosperity  of  the  land. 

Immigration.  The  expansion  of  trade  and  prosperity 
in  South  America  is  proportionate  to  the  introduction 
of  energy  and  capacity  and  character  from  without. 
South  American  progress  is  not  indigenous.  It  is  im- 
ported. Those  countries  which  have  received  no  immi- 
gration are  almost  as  stagnant  "now  as  they  have  been 
for  generations.  The  northern  and  western  nations,  that 
is,  from  Venezuela  around  to  Bolivia,  together  with 
Paraguay,  are  the  backward  nations.  There  are  no  rail- 
roads, no  banks,  no  great  business  interests  in  all  these 
republics  which  do  not  depend  somewhere  upon  foreign 
character  and  ability.  And  even  in  Chile  foreign  enter- 
prise and  integrity  are  employed  in  every  great  com- 
mercial enterprise.  Even  on  the  ships  of  the  Chilean 
corporation,  the  Compania  Sud-Americana  de  Vapores, 
all  the  captains  and  responsible  officers  are  foreign.  And 
it  is  the  scarcity  of  this  foreign  element  in .  all  these 
lands  which  accounts  for  their  backwardness. 

There  has  been  no  immigration  to  any  but  the  four 


COMMERCIAL  57 

leading  republics,  of  Argentina,  Brazil,  Chile,  and  Uru- 
guay. In  Venezuela,  in  1894,  the  latest  reliable  figures 
show  that  there  were  44,129  foreign  residents,  of  whom 
13,179  were  Spaniards,  11,081  Colombians,  6,154  British, 
3,179  Italians,  2,545  French,  962  Germans,  55  North 
Americans.  In  Bolivia  there  are  only  1,441  Europeans. 
In  Peru  about  70,000  people  enter  the  country  annually 
and  60,000  leave,  a  net  gain  of  10,000  per  annum,  but 
few  of  them  are  Europeans.  And  yet  it  is  the  European 
and  American  element  that  is  to  be  credited  with  almost 
all  of  Peru's  commercial  and  industrial  advancement. 
Paraguay,  which  claims  to  be  able  to  support  a  popula- 
tion of  69,000,000  and  has  an  estimated  population  of 
800,000,  reports  only  4,000  Europeans,  although  it  en- 
courages immigration.  Contrast  with  these  lands  the 
four  more  prosperous  states.  Brazil  received  76,292 
colonists  in  1901,  while  the  total  number  who  came  from 
1855  to  1901  was  2,023,693.  The  number  of  immigrants 
is  less  now  than  it  was  twenty  years  ago.  In  1891,  due 
in  part  to  a  crisis  in  the  Argentine  which  lessened  the 
immigration  there,  277,808  people  came  to  Brazil,  of 
whom  116,000  were  Italians.  The  Statesman's  Year 
Book  estimates  that  there  are  1,000,000  Germans  in 
Brazil,  which  is  probably  an  overestimate.  Sao  Paulo 
is  almost  a  foreign  city,  and  the  result  is  seen  in  its 
growth  from  28,000  in  1872  to  64,000  in  1890,  to  239,- 
ooo  in  1900,  its  present  population  being  estimated  at 
400,000.  In  Chile  the  number  of  Germans  and  English 
in  1907  was  over  20,000,  with  as  many  Spaniards,  and 
representatives  of  almost  every  other  European  nation- 
ality. The  Argentine,  which  is  the  South  American 
wonderland  in  wealth  and  development,  is  predominantly 


58          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

foreign.  Even  the  Spanish  element  has  been  almost 
overmastered  by  the  Italian,  and  the  Italian  stock  has 
been  a  good  one.  Argentina  is  becoming  a  new  Italy, 
while  British  and  German  capital,  and,  with  the  capital, 
men  to  supervise  it,  have  been  poured  in  like  water. 
With  us  it  is  now  the  native  stock  that  dominates  and 
improves  the  imported  blood.  In  South  America  the 
imported  blood  dominates  and  improves  the  native  stock. 

Economic  Value  of  Immigration.  Students  of  Latin 
America's  economic  condition  see  that  immigration  is 
indispensable.  "The  only  thing  that  can  make  these 
countries  progress  is  a  large  white  immigration/'  says 
Professor  Ross.  And  Sr.  Calderon  points  out  the  vital 
relation  of  immigration  to  the  whole  economic  problem : 
"The  increase  of  alien  wealth  in  nations  which  are  not 
fertilized  by  powerful  currents  of  immigration  constitutes 
a  real  danger.  To  pay  the  incessantly  increasing  inter- 
est of  the  wealth  borrowed,  fresh  sources  of  production 
and  a  constant  increase  of  economic  exchanges  are 
necessary;  in  a  word,  a  greater  density  of  population. 
The  exhaustion  of  the  human  stock  in  the  debtor  nations 
creates  a  very  serious  lack  of  financial  equilibrium,  which 
may  result,  not  only  in  bankruptcy  but  also  in  the  loss 
of  political  independence  by  annexation.  The  solution 
of  the  financial  problem  depends,  then,  upon  the  solution 
of  the  problem  of  population.  Immigrants  will  solve  it 
by  increasing  the  number  of  productive  units,  by  accumu- 
lating their  savings,  by  irresistible  efforts  which  lay  the 
foundations  of  solid  fortunes."1 

Already  where  the  immigrant  has   come  in  he  has 


1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  383. 


COMMERCIAL  59 

poured  fresh  energy  and  powers  into  the  nations  and 
lifted  them  from  the  depression  of  mestizo  domination. 
In  Argentina  he  is  the  dominant  factor.  He  arrives  as 
an  artisan  or  trader.  His  son  becomes  a  merchant  or 
banker  or  capitalist.  In  Argentina  "of  1,000  inhabit- 
ants there  are  128  Italians  and  only  99  Argentines  who 
own  land.  These  Latins  are  prolific;  in  1904,  1,000 
Argentina  women  gave  life  to  80  infants;  1,000  Spanish 
women  to  123;  and  1,000  Italian  women  to  175. "l 

The  statistics  in  the  following  table2  of  immigration 
to  Argentina  were  obtained  from  the  Argentine  govern- 
ment: 

Immigrants  since        Immigrants 

Nationality  1857                       for  1912 

Italians    2,133,508 165,662 

Spanish    1,298,122 80,583 

French    206,912 S,i8o 

Russians    136,659 20,832 

Syrians  and  Turks 109,234 1 9,792 

Austrians  and  Hungarians 80,736 6,545 

Germans    55,o68 4,337 

English  51,660 3,134 

Swiss    31,624 1,005 

Belgians   22,186 405 

Portuguese    21,378 4,959 

Danes 7,686 1,316 

Dutch    7,120 274 

North  Americans 5,509 499 

Swedes    1,702 94 

Other    Nations 79,251 8,786 


Totals   4,248,355 323,403 

Does  Latin  America  have  moral  and  spiritual  forces 
adequate  to  the  assimilation  and  education  of  this  immi- 
gration? And  is  Latin  America  likely  to  be  able  to 

1  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  364. 

2  Koebel,  The  South  Americans,  16,  17. 


60  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

secure  an  adequate  increase  ?  And  even  if  it  is,  will  the 
lands  that  need  it  most  be  able  to  secure  any  part  of  it? 

Agriculture  and  Manufacture.  It  is  in  these  things 
that  Latin  America  chiefly  needs  development.  It  has 
been  agriculture  which  has  given  Argentina  its  great 
wealth.  But  in  most  of  the  other  Latin-American  lands 
agriculture  is  pitifully  undeveloped  or  perverted.  In 
Chile  what  were  fine  wheat  lands  are  now  devoted  to 
wine  production.  In  Brazil,  apart  from  coffee,  there 
has  been  little  development,  and  the  rubber  industry  is 
unscientifically  conducted.  Comprehensive  and  com- 
petent plans  of  agricultural  education  and  development 
are  indispensable.  And  small  landownership  must  be 
encouraged.  The  system  of  immense  properties,  farmed 
by  peon  labor  and  profiting  an  absentee  landlord  class, 
which  has  ruined  Mexico,  is  growing  in  Chile,  and  in 
Argentina  the  total  number  of  landholdings  is  only  227,- 
ooo,  of  which  1,000  are  above  125,000  acres  each,  and 
9,233  above  6,250  acres.  On  the  other  hand  in  Argen- 
tina one  fifth  of  all  the  holdings  are  in  small  lots  of  less 
than  25  acres. 

Manufactures  are  few  in  Latin  America.  Almost 
everything  is  imported  except  the  articles  of  house-manu- 
facture, and  importations  are  steadily  cutting  in  upon 
these. 

Latin  America  needs  sound,  internal  economic  develop- 
ment, and  to  that  end  three  things  are  absolutely  indis- 
pensable— immigration,  education,  and  the  influence  of 
sound  and  real  religion.  In  some  of  these  things  we  can 
help  Latin  America  and  we  shall  ourselves  be  helped. 
And  trade  connections  should  minister  to  these  higher 
interests.  The  United  States  Commissioner  of  Educa- 


COMMERCIAL  61 

tion,  in  transmitting  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  Dr. 
Brandon's  admirable  review  of  "Latin  American  Uni- 
versities and  Special  Schools,"  said:  "the  value  of  com- 
mercial relations,  .  .  .  the  exchange  of  ideas,  the  feel- 
ing of  interdependence,  the  sentiments  of  friendship, 
fellowship,  and  brotherhood,  and  the  broader  outlook  and 
fuller  and  richer  life  which  come  to  the  people  of  both 
countries  are,  or  should  be,  no  less  important  than  the 
exchange  of  the  products  of  mines,  fields,  forests,  and 
factories,  and  the  material  wealth  gained  thereby."1 

North  America's  Obligation.  Mere  commercial 
relations  have  far  less  enlightening  and  uniting  power 
than  men  once  supposed  they  possessed.  Apparently 
flourishing  trade  may  rest  upon  false  economic  founda- 
tions and  work  moral  destruction.  Purchasing  power 
acquired  by  borrowing  money  and  exercised  to  the  eco- 
nomic debilitation  of  the  purchaser  cannot  be  long  ad- 
vantageous either  to  the  buyer  or  to  the  seller.  Good 
trade  needs  to  rest  on  a  sound  moral  basis,  to  minister 
to  the  development  in  thought  and  industry  and  charac- 
ter of  all  engaged  in  it,  to  strengthen  good  government, 
to  support  just  taxation,  to  procure  the  wise  develop- 
ment and  expenditure  of  natural  resources,  to  promote 
international  confidence  and  good  feeling,  to  advance 
the  well-being  of  all  mankind.  The  Christian  mind  is 
fundamentally  essential  to  the  right  development  of 
world  trade  and  world  wealth.  We  do  ourselves  and 
Latin  America  and  humanity  a  deep  wrong  if  we  do  not 
bring  commercial  relations  with  our  Southern  neighbors 
under  that  mind. 


United  States  Bureau  of  Education,  Bulletin,  1912,  No.  30,  7. 


Ill 

EDUCATIONAL 

"The  educational  traditions  of  Latin  Europe/'  says  the 
Report  of  Commission  III  on  Education,  to  the  Con- 
gress on  Christian  Work  in  Latin  America,  "differed 
from  those  of  northern  Europe  in  that  the  formal  edu- 
cation of  the  schools  was  considered  of  importance  only 
for  the  limited  few.  This  favored  class  included  those 
possessing  superior  intellectual  ability  or  force  of  charac- 
ter and  those  with  social  position  and  influence.  The 
masses  of  the  people  might  have  their  education,  but  it 
was  of  and  through  the  church  and  the  home,  not  the 
school.  This  tradition  Latin  America  took  over  and  pre- 
served well  into  the  nineteenth  century.  Indeed,  this 
view  is  even  yet  maintained  in  most  if  not  in  all  of  her 
countries  by  influential  portions  of  society.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  to  be  noted  that  the  state  school  system  was 
founded  by  the  Latin-American  republics  quite  as  early 
as  it  was  in  most  of  the  commonwealths  of  the  North 
American  Union — aside  from  those  of  New  England — 
and  earlier  than  in  many  of  the  European  countries.  The 
development  of  these  public  school  systems,  however, 
has  been  very  slow;  and  there  is  now  an  illiterate  popu- 
lation varying  from  forty  to  eighty  per  cent.  This  re- 
tarded development  is  partly  explained  by  the  traditional 
disbelief  of  the  Latin  population  in  the  scholastic  educa- 
tion of  the  masses ;  partly  by  the  attitude  of  the  church ; 
partly  by  the  same  factors  that  caused  a  slow  develop- 

63 


64  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

ment  in  Anglo-Saxon  America — vast  territory,  sparse 
population,  diverse  racial  elements,  the  hardships  of 
pioneer  life,  and  the  primal  necessity  of  conquering  the 
natural  environment.  A  further  explanation  of  this  be- 
lated educational  development  is  found  in  the  greater 
power  of  race  assimilation  of  the  Iberian  peoples  as 
compared  with  the  Anglo-Saxons.  A  more  homogeneous 
population  has  thus  been  produced  in  various  areas,  but 
at  the  sacrifice  of  certain  traits  and  essentials  of  mass 
advancement."1 

I.  HIGHER  EDUCATION 

The  Ecclesiastical  Universities.  In  his  admirable  re- 
port on  Latin- American  universities,  Dr.  Edgar  E.  Bran- 
don gives  an  account  of  the  foundation  and  character  of 
the  institutions  of  higher  learning  which  were  estab- 
lished at  the  outset  of  the  Spanish  occupation  for  the 
training  of  the  leaders  of  society.  "The  Spanish  settle- 
ments in  America,"  says  he,  "were  provided  with  the 
means  of  higher  education  with  celerity  equal  to  if  not 
greater  than  that  shown  in  the  English  colonies.  In  less 
than  a  half  century  from  the  date  of  the  first  permanent 
settlement,  schools  for  advanced  education,  as  education 
was  then  regarded,  had  been  established  in  due  and 
permanent  form,  and  by  the  end  of  the  century  there 
existed  a  chain  of  colleges  or  universities  extending  from 
Mexico  and  the  West  Indies  to  the  southernmost  colony 
of  Argentina.  From  that  time  to  the  present,  Spanish 
America  has  been  zealous  in  the  establishment  of  in- 
stitutions for  training  in  the  liberal  professions,  and  dur- 


^Report  of  Commission  III  to  the  Panama  Congress,  8, 


EDUCATIONAL  65 

ing  the  past  century  Portuguese  America  has  kept  pace 
with  her  neighbor/' 

The  dates  of  the  establishment  of  these  colonial  uni- 
versities were:  Mexico  and  Lima,  1551 ;  Santo  Domingo, 
1558;  Bogota,  1572;  Cordoba,  1613;  Sucre,  1623;  Guate- 
mala, about  1675;  Cuzco,  1692;  Caracas,  1721;  Santiago 
de  Chile,  1738;  Havana,  1782;  Quito,  1787. 

"The  church  was  the  prime  mover  in  their  establish- 
ment, although  influential  laymen  holding  high  political 
positions  contributed  notably  to  their  foundation.  The 
principal  object  of  each  university  was  to  promote  the 
cause  of  religion  in  the  colonies  by  providing  an  edu- 
cated clergy  numerous  enough  to  care  for  the  spiritual 
welfare  of  the  settlers  and  to  further  the  work  of  evan- 
gelization among  the  natives.  The  central  department 
of  the  institution  was  the  faculty  of  letters  and  philoso- 
phy, through  which  all  students  must  pass  on  their  way 
to  the  professional  schools.  The  latter  were  exceed- 
ingly limited  in  the  colonial  university.  There  was  a 
department  of  civil  and  canon  law,  but  the  former  was 
overshadowed  in  the  ecclesiastical  organization  of  the 
institution,  and  had  to  await  the  era  of  national  inde- 
pendence before  coming  to  its  own.  The  university 
usually  contained  a  professorship  of  medicine,  but  prior 
to  the  nineteenth  century  it  was  the  medicine  of  the 
medieval  school  men,  academic  and  empirical.  The  one 
professional  school  that  flourished  was  the  faculty  of 
theology.  It  was  for  it  that  the  university  was  created, 
and  to  it  led  all  academic  avenues. 

"Clerical  in  its  origin  and  purpose,  the  colonial  uni- 
versity was  also  clerical  in  its  government.  Theoretically 
the  corporation  enjoyed  large  autonomy,  since  it  formu- 


66          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

lated  its  rules  and  regulations,  chose  its  officers,  and 
selected  professors  for  vacant  chairs.  But  this  autonomy 
was  largely  illusory.  The  professors  were  almost  ex- 
clusively members  of  the  priesthood,  and  as  such  owed 
implicit  obedience  to  the  bishop,  and,  in  addition,  the 
election  of  officers  and  new  professors  required  the 
confirmation  of  the  prelate.  University  autonomy  was, 
therefore,  carefully  circumscribed  by  church  preroga- 
tive, and  this  equivocal  form  of  government  has  been 
transmitted  with  little  change  to  modern  times,  except 
that  the  state  has  taken  the  place  of  the  church/'1  all 
these  universities  being  now  state  institutions. 

The  Secular  Universities.  A  second  group  of  insti- 
tutions originated  in  the  era  of  national  independence. 
The  greatest  of  these  is  the  University  of  Buenos  Aires. 
In  the  university  establishments  of  this  period,  "the 
church  had  no  part,  at  least  not  as  an  organization.  It 
was  to  secular  influence  that  the  universities  and  pro- 
fessional schools  of  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury owe  their  existence,  and  from  the  first  they  have 
depended  upon  civil  authority,  either  local  or  national. 
In  this  same  period  the  old  universities  were  taken  over 
more  or  less  completely  by  the  state,  and  in  many  added 
importance  was  at  once  given  to  the  subjects  of  medicine 
and  civil  law.  By  their  break  with  the  mother  country 
the  Spanish  states  were  thrown  upon  their  own  resources 
in  matters  educational.  The  continuous  stream  of  gov- 
ernors, judges,  administrators,  and  physicians  that  had 
flowed  for  three  centuries  from  the  metropolis  into  the 
colonies  was  suddenly  arrested.  The  supply  must  here- 

1  United  States  Bureau  of  Education    Bulletin,  1912,  No.  30, 

II,  12. 


EDUCATIONAL  67 

after  come  from  native  sources.  Moreover,  in  the  flush 
of  newborn  independence  there  was  engendered  an  in- 
tense feeling  of  local  pride  and  a  determination  to  be- 
come self-sufficient  in  culture  as  well  as  in  politics.  The 
rapid  extension  of  law  schools,  the  increased  importance 
ascribed  to  this  branch  of  study  in  the  older  universities, 
and  the  dominant  position  it  has  ever  since  held  in  the 
Spanish- American  university,  is  in  great  measure  the. 
result  of  influence  that  gathered  and  pressed  upon  the 
public  consciousness  in  those  early  years  of  national  in- 
dependence. Society  was  to  be  reconstituted,  a  govern- 
ment to  be  organized,  colonial  thraldom  to  be  replaced 
by  civil  and  political  liberty.  What  nobler  mission  for 
the  sons  of  a  new  commonwealth  than  to  prepare  them- 
selves by  a  study  of  jurisprudence  and  political  sciences 
for  their  country's  service !  While  ancient  principles  of 
law  still  subsisted  and  court  procedure  remained  much 
the  same,  new  codes  were  made  in  the  several  states  and 
republican  ideals  were  substituted  for  monarchical  tradi- 
tions. It  was  absolutely  necessary  for  the  young  re- 
publics to  train  their  lawgivers,  jurists,  and  public  officials 
in  the  atmosphere  of  democratic  institutions.  National 
self-preservation  demanded  national  schools  of  juris- 
prudence. Consequently,  in  the  old  universities,  as  well 
as  in  the  newly  created  ones,  the  faculty  of  law  and 
political  sciences  assumed  such  importance  that  it  soon 
overshadowed  the  other  faculties  and  came  to  be  con- 
sidered by  far  the  most  important  department  of  higher 
education. 

"The  definitive  organization  of  the  medical  faculty  as 
a  distinct  department  of  the  university  dates  also  from 
the  same  period  as  that  of  law.  It  has  been  stated  that 


68          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

the  schools  of  Rio  de  Janeiro  and  Bahia  were  founded 
in  1808.  The  medical  faculty  of  Guatemala  places  its 
beginning  in  the  year  1804,  Lima  considers  1811  the  date 
of  its  final  organization,  and  Caracas  counts  from  the 
revised  statutes  of  the  university  in  1826.  In  Buenos 
Aires  a  school  of  medicine  was  founded  in  1801  and  en- 
larged in  1813.  In  1821  it  amalgamated  with  the  new 
university.  Political  independence  did  not  have  the 
same  overwhelming  influence  on  medical  studies  that 
it  did  on  the  study  of  law,  but  separation  from  the  mother 
country  could  not  fail  to  encourage  the  development  of 
local  institutions  in  a  subject  so  important  as  that  of 
medicine." 

Scientific  faculties  were  soon  developed  also.  Their 
origin,  Dr.  Brandon  says,  "owes  nothing  to  political  or 
national  development,  but  is  rather  to  be  traced  to  the 
academic  influence  of  the  Encyclopedlstes  of  France, 
who  urged  the  importance  of  mathematical  and  scientific 
studies,  and  whose  ideas  were  in  great  part  incorporated 
into  the  French  system  of  education  under  the  First 
Republic,  to  be  imitated  later  in  the  Spanish  republics  of 
America.  In  fact,  it  may  be  affirmed  that  the  dominant 
influence  in  the  educational  life  of  Latin- American  coun- 
tries since  their  emancipation,  as  well  as  in  their  social 
and  political  life,  has  been  French  and  not  Spanish." 

A  third  group  of  higher  institutions,  founded  more 
recently,  owes  its  origin  to  various  circumstances.  "The 
University  of  Montevideo,  beginning  with  a  law  school 
in  1849,  marks  the  final  crystallization  of  Uruguayan 
nationality."  Many  provincial  or  state  professional 
schools  have  developed.  This  has  been  the  tendency  in- 
stead of  a  nationalizing  policy,  whereas  the  need  in  some 


EDUCATIONAL  69 

sections  would  seem  to  be  now  for  international  uni- 
versities. For  example,  in  Central  America,  Dr.  Bran- 
don says,  "no  one  of  the  five  small  republics  is  populous 
enough  or  rich  enough  to  maintain  a  complete  first-class 
university.  A  solution  of  the  problem  of  higher  educa- 
tion there  might  be  found  in  the  reestablishment  of  the 
old  federation  and  the  exercise  of  the  policy  of  distribut- 
ing the  various  branches  of  the  federal  government  among 
the  states  in  order  to  allay  local  jealousies,  as  has 
recently  been  done  so  successfully  in  British  South 
Africa/'1 

Latin-American  Universities  Unlike  Those  of  the 
United  States.  The  report  of  the  Panama  Congress 
Commission  on  Education  calls  attention  to  several  points 
of  differentiation  between  the  universities  of  Latin  Amer- 
ica and  the  United  States  and  Canada. 

(1)  The  former,  with  a  few  exceptions,  are  composed 
of  professional  faculties  only.     There  is  nothing  cor- 
responding to  the  North  American  college.    To  compen- 
sate, the  curricula  of  the  professional  faculties  are  much 
broader  than  those  of  professional  schools  in  the  United 
States,  and  the  theoretical  length  of  their  courses  is  often 
six  or  even  seven  years. 

(2)  The  Latin- American  universities  have  generally 
no  physical  unity.    As  there  are  only  diverse  professional 
faculties  no  central  plant  is  required. 

(3)  There    is    no    permanent,    professional    teaching 
staff.     The  faculties  are  composed  of  professional  men 
who  give  a  small  part  of  their  time  to  lectures.     "This 
scheme  has  certain  advantages.     It  keeps  the  instruction 

United  States  Bureau  of  Education-  Bulletin,  1912,  No.  30, 
13-15,  18. 


70          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

in  close  touch  with  the  actual  problems  and  interests  of 
life.  It  brings  the  student  into  familiar  contact  with  the 
actual  practitioner  of  his  profession.  It  freshens  and 
vivifies  the  instruction.  But  it  misses  all  of  those  in- 
direct and  subsidiary  advantages  of  the  college  and  uni- 
versity life  which  are  most  significant  for  the  American 
or  the  English  boy." 

(4)  There  is  little  or  no  university  organization  or 
machinery. 

(5)  "The  Latin- American  universities  possess  a  dis- 
tinct advantage  over  similar  institutions  in  the  United 
States  in  that  they  form  the  sole  gateway  to  the  profes- 
sions.    The  various  professional  schools  not  only  have 
the  duty  of  training  for  the  practise  of  the  profession, 
but  as  administrative  departments  of  the  governments, 
they   are  charged   with   licensing   practitioners    in   the 
various  lines." 

(6)  The  Latin-American  universities   are   controlled 
and  conducted  by  the  state.    "The  minister  of  education 
has  immediate  control.     Appointments  are  often  if  not 
usually  made  directly  by  the  executive  head  of  the  gov- 
ernment.     Such   appointments   include   all   lectureships, 
the  few  administrative  officers,  and  even  the  most  menial 
assistant.     The  state  also  controls  the  curriculum ;  it  is 
responsible,  so  far  as  responsibility  exists,  for  the  living 
conditions  and  the  conduct  of  the  students  as  well  as  for 
the  physical  plant  and  its  upkeep.     This  also  explains 
the  fact  that  whatever  influence  the  student  body  has  in 
the  way  of  control  is  exerted  through  public  or  political 
agitation    and    directly    upon    the    government.      Thus 
student  demonstration  or  agitation  concerning  political 
and  religious  matters  is  the  chief  occasion  for  the  expres- 


EDUCATIONAL  71 

sion  of  opinion  or  the  exercise  of  influence  by  the  student 
body." 

(7)  "As  a  consequence  of  all  these  features,  there 
results  one  final  characteristic  of  the  Latin-American 
institutions,  viz.,  that  there  is  no  unified  student  life. 
There  is  no  campus,  no  dormitory,  no  class  organization, 
no  faculty.  There  are  few  common  student  interests, 
and  students  have  no  means  of  exercising  any  control 
over  the  university  life."1 

Prestige  of  the  Universities.  The  Latin-American 
nations  hold  their  universities  and  university  degrees  in 
the  highest  honor.  Dr.  Brandon  says :  "The  rapidly 
increasing  enrolment  in  institutions  of  higher  learning 
is  a  phenomenon  as  striking  in  several  countries  of  Latin 
America  as  it  is  in  the  United  States.  The  only  differ- 
ence' is  that  in  the  latter  country  the  faculty  of  letters, 
philosophy,  and  pure  science  shares  in  the  increase,  while 
in  the  former  the  drift  is  wholly  toward  the  professional 
faculties.  Chile,  with  a  population  of  only  3,000,000, 
enrolls  annually  almost  2,000  students  in  the  national 
university  and  upward  of  700  in  the  Catholic  university, 
a  gain  of  50  per  cent,  in  a  decade.  Argentina,  with  a 
population  of  7,500,000,  enrolls  in  her  four  universities 
7,000  students,  of  whom  about  5,000  are  matriculated 
in  the  University  of  Buenos  Aires  alone.  A  quarter  of 
a  century  ago  the  total  university  population  was  less 
than  800  and  the  enrolment  at  Buenos  Aires  600.  At 
Lima  there  are  1,100  students  in  the  university  and  in 
the  detached  schools  of  engineering  and  agriculture, 
while  the  three  provincial  universities  of  Peru  add  about 


1  Report  of  Commission.  Ill  to  the  Panama  Congress,  13-15. 


72          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

400  more.  In  Brazil  the  number  of  law  and  medical 
students  is  disproportionately  large,  and  the  government 
is  seeking  some  practicable  method  of  checking  the  con- 
stant increase.  .  .  .  Other  Latin-American  nations  in 
proportion  to  their  population  show  a  large  student 
enrolment,  and  the  number  is  everywhere  a  surprise 
when  one  considers  the  economic,  social,  and  racial  dis- 
advantages under  which  some  countries  labor."1 

II.  SECONDARY  EDUCATION 

"The  secondary  schools/'  called  liceos  or  colegws, 
says  the  Panama  Congress  Report,  "form  the  most  im- 
portant and  most  flourishing  part  of  the  educational 
system  of  all  Latin-American  countries.  Being  the  sole 
gateway  to  the  universities  and  to  the  professions,  and 
especially  adapted  to  the  interests  and  needs  of  the  rul- 
ing classes,  they  are  the  objects  of  peculiar  interest  to 
both  state  and  church,  by  which  they  are  generously 
supported.  Additional  reasons  for  their  importance  are 
to  be  found  also  in  the  indifferent  and  undeveloped 
character  of  elementary  schools ;  in  the  diverse  racial 
elements  composing  the  population ;  in  the  preponderance 
of  the  Indian  and  mixed  races  (Argentina,  Chile,  and 
Uruguay  excepted)  ;  in  the  aristocratic  structure  of 
society  and  the  aristocratic  character  of  education."  The 
secondary  schools  are  state-administered  like  the  uni- 
versities. They  are  not  directly  related  to  the  elementary 
schools.  There  are  more  permanent  regular  teachers 
than  in  the  universities.  The  course  is  six  years. 

Comparison  with  the  United  States.    "In  comparison 

1  United  States  Bureau  of  Education,  Bulletin,   1912,   No.  30, 

21. 


EDUCATIONAL  73 

with  the  secondary  programs  of  the  United  States  the 
following  points  may  again  be  emphasized:  (i)  slight 
attention  given  to  the  classics;  (2)  greater  time  given 
to  the  national  language  and  literature;  (3)  great  em- 
phasis on  modern  languages ;  (4)  the  presence  of  philoso- 
phy, logic,  psychology,  ethics,  and  sociology;  (5)  similar 
attention  to  drawing,  geography,  and  military  exercises/' 
"The  age  of  the  liceo  graduate/!  says  Dr.  Brandon,  "is 
about  the  same  as  that  of  the  American  boy  when  he 
finishes  the  high  school.  The  Latin  American  is  per- 
haps superior  in  breadth  of  vision,  cosmopolitan  sym- 
pathy, power  of  expression,  and  argumentative  ability, 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  perhaps  inferior  in  the  powers 
of  analysis  and  initiative  and  in  the  spirit  of  self-re- 
liance/'1 

Secondary  School  Attendance.  As  the  proportion  of 
university  students  is  high,  so,  to  our  view,  the  propor- 
tion of  secondary  school  students  is  very  low.  Colombia, 
with  a  population  of  4,000,000,  reports,  says  Professor 
Ross,  "229  schools  (colegios  or  liceos)  with  an  attend- 
ance of  19,000.  Two  thousand  lads  are  studying  in 
Ecuador  in  19  such  schools.  Peru  has  27  state  coleglos 
with  an  attendance  of  2,000  and  enough  private  colegios 
— most  of  them  belonging  to  religious  orders — to  round 
out  the  number  to  50.  Bolivia  has  14  such  schools — 8 
of  them  government  institutions — with  1,800  pupils. 
Chile  has  61  government  colegios,  two  thirds  of  them 
for  boys,  and  subsidizes  67  private  secondary  schools. 
Argentina  records  28  national  colegios  with  an  attend- 
ance of  8,000.  Her  number  of  secondary  pupils  alto- 


1  Report  of  Commission  III  to  the  Panama  Congress,  16,  18,  19. 


74          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

gather  does  not  exceed  15,000.  Such  a  proportion  is 
amazingly  low.  In  Salta,  a  province  of  160,000,  only  339 
persons  are  in  high  school.  In  Rosario,  a  city  as  big  as 
St.  Paul,  there  is  one  national  high  school  with  450 
students.  Pennsylvania,  with  about  the  same  population 
as  Argentina,  has  six  times  as  many  pupils  in  her  high 
schools,  although  the  number  of  years  is  four  as  against 
six  for  the  colegios  of  the  southern  republic. 

Obstacles  to  Secondary  Education.  "The  public  high 
school  is  obliged  to  make  its  way  against  the  opposition 
of  pay  schools,  some  of  them  with  a  strong  commercial 
bent  like  our  'business  colleges/  others  maintained  by  the 
teaching  orders — Jesuits,  Salesians,  Dominicans,  Merce- 
darians,  Sacred  Heart  or  Christian  Brothers — and 
favored  by  the  wealthy  either  as  more  religious  or  more 
exclusive  than  the  free  public  high  schools.  The  high 
school,  moreover,  is  not,  as  with  us,  the  people's  college. 
It  is  a  fitting  school  for  the  university  and  the  profes- 
sional schools.  Eighty  per  cent,  of  its  graduates  go  on  to 
pursue  higher  studies.  It  belongs,  therefore,  on  the  whole 
to  the  upper  class,  while  the  great  bulk  of  the  people 
never  aspire  to  advance  their  children  beyond  the  ele- 
mentary school.  There  is  a  deep  gulf  between  the  two 
grades  of  education  and  between  the  teachers  of  the  two 
grades,  so  that  both  pupils  and  teachers  are  drawn  from 
different  social  classes."1 

III.  ELEMENTARY  EDUCATION 

"The  elementary  school,"  says  the  Panama  Congress 
Report,  "is  the  least  developed  part  of  the  educational 


1  South  of  Panama  f  286. 


EDUCATIONAL  75 

system  of  Latin  America.  This  fact  explains  many  of 
the  political,  social,  and  intellectual  conditions  in  these 
countries.  But  the  educational  situation  is  in  turn  ex- 
plained by  the  political  and  social  conditions,  to  which 
should  be  added  the  influence  of  natural  environment  and 
of  historical  tradition."  And  the  report  proceeds  to 
state  some  of  the  elements  of  the  situation  which  affect 
the  work  of  elementary  schools. 

(1)  Racial  elements.     "The  populations  of  no  other 
countries  of  modern  civilization  have  racial  elements  so 
diverse  as  those  of  the  Latin- American  republics,  and 
there  are  none  in  which  the  backward  races  are  so  numer- 
ous. 

(2)  "Even  with  a  homogeneous  racial  composition, 
sparse  settlements  and  vast  extent  of  territory  may 
make  universal  education  well-nigh  impossible.    In  many 
regions  of  agricultural  Argentina,  with  its  white  popula- 
tion, one  hundred  square  miles  would  not  furnish  the 
children  for  a  school." 

(3)  Class  organization  and  social  traditions.    "Both 
of  these  factors  operate  against  a  popular  elementary 
school  system.    Where  such  schools  exist  they  are  seldom 
attended  by  children  of  the  influential  and  better-to-do 
classes. 

"The  traditions  of  the  Latin  races  have  few  of  the 
democratic  elements  common  to  the  Anglo-Saxons  of  the 
north,  out  of  which  grew  the  common  school  system. 
The  public  elementary  school  system  of  Latin  America 
was  an  importation,  the  work  of  the  political  and  revolu- 
tionary idealists  influential  during  different  periods  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  .  .  .  The  temporary  economic  in- 
terests of  the  classes  are  not  conserved  by  popular  educa- 


76          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

tion,  while  the  masses  do  not  have  and  could  not  be 
expected  to  have  an  interest  in  popular  education  or  an 
appreciation  of  its  value.  Such  public  mass  education 
as  they  have  must  come  as  a  gift  of  the  enlightened  few. 

"This  characterization  is  true  when  viewed  by  the 
Anglo-Saxon.  A  truer  statement,  no  doubt,  is  that  there 
is  a  type  of  democracy  which  is  Anglo-Saxon  and  a  type 
which  is  Latin.  Each  possesses  factors  which  the  other 
lacks." 

(4)  Attitude  of  the  Roman  Church  and  of  the  clergy. 
In  few  countries  does  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  retain 
so  great  a  political  influence  over  the  government  and 
over  the  ruling  classes  in  society  as  in  Latin  America, 
and  in  few  do  the  governments  so  protect  the  church. 
"This  remains  true  notwithstanding  the  facts  that  in 
several  the  church  has  been  disestablished,  that  in  nearly 
all,  the  schools  have  been  taken  from  the  control  of  the 
church,  that  in  some  no  religious  instruction  whatever  is 
allowed  in  the  schools,  and  that  in  all  a  large  class  of  'in- 
tellectuals' of  great  political  and  social  influence  is  irrev- 
ocably committed  to  hostility  to  the  church.  Previous 
to  the  establishment  of  the  republican  form  of  govern- 
ment in  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  (except 
in  Brazil),  the  church  controlled  all  education.  For  the 
masses  it  provided  for  education  in  religious,  ceremonial, 
and  catechetical  instruction,  with  industrial  training  for 
very  limited  regions  and  groups.  At  the  present  time  the 
church  believes  in  little  if  any  more  for  the  masses, 
Literary  education  will  be  of  no  advantage  to  them,  it 
believes,  and  may  be  of  very  great  disadvantage — as 
witness  the  intellectuals.  Hence  on  the  part  of  the  most 
powerful  social  institution  there  is  indifference  at  best 


EDUCATIONAL  77 

and  often  active  hostility  to  public  elementary  education. 
This  situation  is  rendered  no  less  acute  by  the  fact  that 
the  church  still  remains  powerful  in  the  public  school 
system,  controlling  it  in  countries  like  Colombia  and 
Ecuador.  Practically  all  the  countries  allow  religious 
instruction  in  the  public  schools  by  the  established  or 
dominant  church.  Of  the  three  countries  most  advanced 
in  public  education  Chile  commands  such  religious  in- 
struction in  the  public  schools,  Argentina  permits  it, 
Brazil  alone  forbids  it."1 

The  facts  with  regard  to  the  relation  of  the  church  to 
the  state  and  education  may  be  briefly  summarized  as 
follows : 

Roman  Catholicism  is  the  state  religion  or  enjoys 
state  support  in  Argentina,  Bolivia,  Chile,  Colombia, 
Ecuador,  Peru,  Paraguay,  Venezuela,  Costa  Rica,  Salva- 
dor, and  Haiti.  In  these  republics  there  are  varying 
degrees  of  religious  instruction,  Chile  and  Colombia  mak- 
ing it  compulsory  in  the  public  schools;  Bolivia,  Ecuador, 
Paraguay,  Peru,  Uruguay,  Venezuela,  Costa  Rica,  and 
Haiti  making  it  optional  or  requiring  study  of  the  cate- 
chism. In  Bolivia,  Ecuador,  and  Colombia  secondary 
education  practically  belongs  to  the  church. 

In  Brazil,  Guatemala,  Honduras,  Nicaragua,  Mexico, 
Panama,  Porto  Rico,  and  Cuba  there  is  entire  separation 
of  state  and  church.  Religious  instruction  is  not  per- 
mitted in  the  schools,  except  that  it  is  optional  in  Panama 
and  in  various  parishes  in  Cuba. 

(5)  Illiteracy.  These  factors  help  to  explain  the 
neglect  of  popular  elementary  education  in  Latin  Amer- 


^Report  of  Commission  III  to  the  Panama  Congress,  19-21. 


78          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 


ica.  And  that  neglect  and  the  reasons  for  it  are  responsi 
ble  for  the  dead  weight  of  illiteracy  and  ignorance  which 
the  Latin-American  republics  have  to  carry  and  which 
retard  and  depress  their  life  and  progress.  There  is  no 
escaping  the  facts.  The  Boston  Pilot  (September  6, 
1913)  says  in  an  editorial  entitled  "Slanderers,"  "The 
percentage  of  illiteracy  [in  South  America]  is  only  a 
little  larger  than  in  the  majority  of  the  states  of  North 
America."  On  the  contrary,  the  largest  percentage  of 
illiteracy  in  the  United  States  is  in  Louisiana  where  the 
rate  is  38  per  cent.  In  Latin  America  the  best  estimates 
are:  Brazil,  71  per  cent.;  Argentina,  50  per  cent,  of  per- 
sons six  years  of  age  and  older;  Chile,  63  per  cent.; 
Colombia,  80  per  cent. ;  Uruguay,  40  per  cent,  of  persons 
six  years  of  age  and  older;  and  Mexico,  63  per  cent,  of 
persons  over  12. 

Marrion  Wilcox,  a  friend  and  student  of  the  Latin- 
American  people,  writes  frankly,  "One  is  obliged  to 
concur  in  the  judgment  of  the  Latin  Americans  them- 
selves who  admit  that  it  [education]  is  neglected.  While 
it  is  true  that  in  most  of  the  countries  attendance  at 
school  is  compulsory,  none  of  the  governments  enforce 
the  law  in  this  respect  owing  to  the  lack  of  funds.  The 
percentage  of  school  attendance  based  on  the  population 
is  as  follows:  Argentina,  10;  Uruguay,  7;  Chile,  3.7; 
Paraguay,  3.5;  Peru,  2.36;  Brazil,  2;  Bolivia,  2."1 

The  issue  of  June  23,  1909,  of  O  Estado  de  Sao  Paulo, 
the  leading  newspaper  in  Sao  Paulo,  contained  a  letter 
from  a  cor  respondent  bemoaning  the  delinquency  of  Brazil 
in  the  education  of  her  people.  In  Brazil,  he  said,  only 


1  The  Student  World,  January,  1909,  5. 


EDUCATIONAL  79 

'28  out  of  each  1,000  of  the  population  were  in  school; 
in  Paraguay,  47 ;  in  Chile,  53 ;  in  Uruguay,  79 ;  in  Argen- 
tina, 96.  In  the  Argentine,  out  of  a  population  (then) 
of  6,200,000,  597,203  or  9.632  per  cent,  were  in  school ; 
in  Brazil,  out  of  19,910,646  (his  figures)  only  565,942  or 
2.842  per  cent.  In  the  United  States,  19  per  cent,  of  the 
entire  population  are  in  school ;  in  Germany,  over  16 
per  cent. ;  in  Japan,  over  12  per  cent.  In  other  words, 
about  four  times  as  large  a  proportion  of  the  American 
population  are  in  school  as  of  the  entire  population  of 
South  America.  Latin  America  has  no  greater  social 
need  than  the  education  of  the  masses  of  the  people.  Re- 
publics cannot  be  built  upon  illiteracy,  and  the  hopeful 
nations  of  the  South  are  paralyzed  in  their  highest 
progress  by  the  dead  weight  of  ignorance  which  clogs 
their  every  step.  The  Mexico  of  to-day  could  never 
have  been  had  the  common  people  been  educated. 

IV.  EDUCATIONAL  NEEDS 

i.  Thoroughness.  There  is  much  good  work  done  in 
higher  institutions,  and  in  some  countries  like  Chile  and 
Argentina,  in  lower  schools  also,  but  the  educational 
system  is  top-heavy  and  as  Sr.  Nelson  of  Argentina  says, 
"theoretical."  Much  work  is  showy  rather  than  solid 
and  real.  All  this  is  part  of  the  situation  to  be  met. 
Mr.  Wilcox  says:  "It  is  absolutely  necessary  to  realize 
certain  characteristics  of  the  Latin-American  mind  in 
order  to  understand  present  conditions  in  education  in 
South  America.  In  these  matters,  our  friends  in  the 
Southern  republics  are  not  self-reliant  but  dependent, 
and  their  attainments  are  apt  to  be  showy  rather  than 
substantial.  They  themselves  characterize  their  enthu- 


8o          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

siasms  as  'fire  in  straw/  blazing  up  quickly  but  not  usually 
supplying  force  for  sustained  effort.  As  for  strength 
of  intellectual  fiber,  that  is  always  and  everywhere  a  ques- 
tion of  character.  In  Chile,  for  example,  native  boys 
and  young  Englishmen  work  side  by  side  in  the  same  busi- 
ness houses.  The  former  quite  outstrip  the  latter,  show- 
ing more  ability  while  they  are  still  quite  young,  but  fall- 
ing behind  in  the  long  race  simply  because  they  have  not 
learned  lessons  of  self-reliance  and  self-control.  When 
a  solid  foundation  of  good  habits  shall  take  the  place  of 
irregularity,  self-indulgence,  and  the  vices  that  are  too 
often  acquired  in  the  South  American  home  and  school, 
the  latent  talent  of  these  peoples  will  command  world 
wide  attention."1 

At  the  same  time  it  is  to  be  remembered  that,  as  Mr. 
J.  H.  Warner  of  Pernambuco  says  of  the  Brazilian 
students:  "We  are  not  dealing,  as  some  believe,  with 
men  of  inferior  intellect.  In  linguistic  ability  especially, 
it  is  probable  that  no  students  excel  the  Latins.  It  is  no 
uncommon  thing  to  meet  an  educated  Brazilian  audience 
which  is  capable  of  appreciating  fully  a  literary  program 
comprising,  besides  numbers  in  Portuguese,  selections 
from  Italian,  Spanish,  French,  English,  and  German 
literature.  In  such  an  audience  many  are  able  to  speak 
as  well  as  understand  several  of  these  languages.  With 
so  many  avenues  of  intercourse  and  such  mental  agility, 
it  is  not  surprising  that  the  Brazilian  student  is  extremely 
sensitive  to  any  influence  that  may  be  brought  to  bear 
upon  him.2  . 

1  The  Student  World,  January,  1909. 

2  "Religion  among  Brazilian  Students,"   The  Student  World, 
January,  1909. 


EDUCATIONAL  81 

What  is  true  of  the  Brazilian  is  true  of  others.  The 
South  American  young  men  are  quick,  alert,  responsive. 
They  are  deserving  of  all  our  friendship  and  assistance. 
But  they  need,  as  we  do,  moral  bottom,  character,  stability 
— just  the  qualities  which  only  robust,  ethical,  open- 
minded  and  fearless  religious  principle  can  give  them. 

2.  Modern  Methods.    There  are  three  great  general 
deficiencies  which  Professor  Rowe  sets  forth  in  his  paper, 
published  by  the  United  States  Commissioner  of  Educa- 
tion, on  "Educational  Progress  in  the  Argentine  Republic 
and  Chile:"  (i)  The  "tendency  to  impose  the  same  course 
of  study  on  every  boy  and  girl,  quite  irrespective  of  their 
taste  or  subsequent  vocations."    (2)  The  lack  of  a  trained 
"corps  of  professional  teachers  for  the  liceos,  or  high 
schools."     (3)  The  neglect  of  the  education  of  women.1 

3.  Elementary  Teachers.     Latin  America  needs  an 
army  of  trained  elementary  school  teachers  who  will  do 
their  work  in  the  highest  spirit  of  patriotism  and  fidelity. 
And  where  the  problem  of  woman's  work  and  training 
is  such  a  difficult  problem  the  provision  of  such  an  army 
of  teachers  is  no  small  task.    Argentina  and  Brazil  gladly 
accepted  our  help  in  it  in  early  years.    And  we  owe  other 
Latin-American  nations  all  the  friendly  aid  we  can  give. 

4.  Industrial  Education.    Industrial  and  agricultural 
education  is  a  great  need.    The  more  progressive  states 
are  interested  in  providing  such  education  and  the  Sale- 
sian  Fathers  have  done  good  work  in  this  field.    It  is  the 
kind  of  education  needed  by  the  great  mass  of  the  agricul- 
tural and  industrial  body  of  the  nations. 

5.  Professional  Training.    There  is  need,  as  every- 

aReport  of  the  Commissioner  of  Education  for  1909,  325,  326, 
327. 


82          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

where,  for  more  thorough  and  efficient  normal  educa- 
tion. A  teacher  in  the  state  of  Parana,  Brazil,  writes — 
and  what  he  says  is  typical  of  education  in  many  Latin- 
American  lands: 

"I  wish  to  speak  of  the  tremendous  educational  need 
of  this  part  of  the  world.  The  superintendent  of  public 
instruction  says  in  his  official  report,  'We  have  professors 
without  competence  and  without  calling/  He  speaks  of 
the  fact  that  ten  years  ago  the  law  allowed  most  any  one 
without  training  to  teach  provisionally,  as  this  was  the 
only  way  to  get  teachers.  There  scarcely  existed  trained 
teachers.  These  unfortunately  later  received  regular 
appointment.  They  were  not  appointed  because  they 
were  capable  but  because  they  were  docile  instruments 
of  the  local  political  machine.  When  the  time  for  exami- 
nation came  no  one  feared  that  he  would  be  turned  down. 
There  was  a  ratifying  en  masse  of  professors  almost 
illiterate,  except  for  few  and  honorable  exceptions.  The 
other  day  a  man  who  was  talked  of  in  the  papers  as  timber 
for  vice-governor  of  the  state,  told  me  that  where  he 
lives  a  teacher  drew  salary  continually,  and  for  more  than 
a  year  did  not  so  much  as  open  the  door  of  the  school- 
house.  The  teacher  is  politically  protected.  This  case 
represents  a  large  per  cent,  indeed  of  all  the  public  em- 
ployees of  this  part  of  Brazil.  The  idea  of  a  graded 
school  is  almost  unknown  here.  The  superintendent 
further  declares,  'We  have  to-day  in  the  most  important 
cities  of  the  state,  schoolhouses  where  four  independent 
schools  function,  each  one  with  an  excessive  number  of 
pupils,  distributed  in  four  classes/  It  is  not  unusual  for 
a  teacher  to  have  50  or  60  pupils  of  all  grades.  Now 
when  you  remember  the  quality  of  these  teachers  and 


EDUCATIONAL  83 

their  excessive  number  of  pupils  all  thrown  together  (the 
classification  is  based  on  the  pupils'  preference  of 
teacher),  and  the  fact  which  our  authority  cites  that 
there  are  only  20  per  cent,  of  the  children  of  school  age 
in  these  inefficient  schools,  you  get  some  idea  of  the 
educational  opportunity  and  duty  in  Parana.  For  120,- 
ooo  children  there  are  only  504  schools.  Prepared  and 
efficient  teachers  are  almost  unknown.  I  refer,  of  course, 
only  to  this  part  of  the  country.  Some  states  are  much 
worse  and  some,  better." 

6.  Rational  Attitude  toward  Atheism.  The  Roman 
Catholic  Church  distrust  of  higher  state  education  justi- 
fies itself  by  pointing  to  the  almost  universal  unbelief 
among  the  "intellectuals"  in  all  the  Latin-American 
nations.  Mr.  Charles  J.  Ewald  of  Buenos  Aires  writes : 

"The  National  University  at  Buenos  Aires  has  enrolled 
over  4,000  young  men  of  the  influential  classes  of  the 
Argentine  Republic.  At  least  half  of  them  come  from 
the  smaller  cities  and  towns  and  live  in  the  boarding 
houses  of  the  city.  The  atmosphere  in  which  these 
students  live  is  not  conducive  to  moral  vigor.  There 
is  every  encouragement  to  immorality  and  gambling  which 
are  the  great  vices  and,  unfortunately,  the  great  majority 
have  no  conscience  on  these  sins. 

"As  regards  religion,  I  would  say  that  not  over  10 
per  cent,  of  them  are  more  than  nominally  identified 
with  Roman  Catholicism,  which  is  the  state  religion. 
Another  10  per  cent,  takes  a  hostile  attitude  toward  the 
Roman  Church.  This  hostility  does  not  mean,  however, 
that  there  is  any  sympathy  with  Protestantism,  in  the 
best  sense  of  that  word.  They  are  in  sympathy  with 
a  Protestantism  that  protests  but  they  have  had  no  con- 


84          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

tact  with  evangelical  Christianity.  Christianity  and 
Romanism,  indeed,  mean  to  them  one  and  the  same  thing. 
The  great  mass  of  students  are  indifferent,  never  hav- 
ing given  any  thought  to  religious  questions.  They  be- 
lieve in  nothing."1 

And  Mr.  Warner  has  set  forth  also  from  personal 
knowledge  the  conditions  in  Brazil : 

"Senhor  Argymiro  Galvao  was  at  one  time  lecturer  on 
philosophy  in  the  law  school  in  Sao  Paulo,  in  many 
respects  the  leading  law  school  in  Brazil.  One  of  his 
lectures,  'The  Conception  of  God/  was  published  as  a 
tract  as  late  as  1906.  I  quote  the  following  from  the 
lecture:  'The  Catholic  faith  is  dead.  There  is  no  longer 
confidence  in  Christian  dogma.  The  supernatural  has 
been  banished  from  the  domain  of  science.  The  con- 
quests of  philosophy  have  done  away  with  the  old  pre- 
conception of  spirituality.  Astronomy,  with  Laplace, 
has  invaded  the  heavenly  fields  and  in  all  celestial  space 
tiiere  has  not  been  found  a  kingdom  for  your  God.  .  .  . 
We  are  in  the  realm  of  realism.  The  reason  meditates 
not  on  theological  principles,  but  upon  facts  furnished 
by  experience.  God  is  a  myth,  he  has  no  reality,  he  is 
not  an  object  of  science.  .  .  .  Man  invented  gods  and 
God  that  the  world  might  be  ruled.  These  conceptions 
resulted  from  his  progressive  intelligence.  The  simple 
spirit  refrains  from  all  criticism  and  accepts  the  idea  of 
God  without  resistance.  The  cultured  spirit  repels  the 
idea  in  virtue  of  its  inherent  contradictions/ 

"Galvao  is  only  one  of  many  educators  in  the  best 
schools  of  Brazil  who  have  broken  with  the  church,  and, 

1  The  Student  World,  January,  1909,  7,  8. 


EDUCATIONAL  85 

of  all  the  hundreds  of  students  that  annually  sit  under 
these  teachings,  very  few  could  be  found  who  would 
question  the  accuracy  of  this  line  of  thought  or  seek  to 
justify  the  Christian  faith. 

"The  great  difficulty  that  confronts  the  laborer  in  this 
field  is  not  that  of  tearing  men  away  from  an  old  faith. 
The  great  majority  have  already  repudiated  their  old 
faith.  The  pity  of  it  is  that  they  think  they  have  repudi- 
ated Christianity."1 

There  is  urgent  need  of  agencies  which  will  reach 
these  students  with  the  gospel. 

7.  International  Cooperation.  There  is  great  need  of 
educational  cooperation  among  the  Latin-American 
nations,  in  the  study  of  their  common  problems,  the  pro- 
vision of  text-books,  the  training  of  teachers,  and  the 
achievement  of  ideals.  There  is  no  such  unity.  As  Dr. 
Brandon  says,  with  regard  to  the  need  of  school  texts: 
"Spanish  America  is  not  one  unit.  On  the  contrary,  it 
is  broken  up  into  20  different  units,  widely  separated  as 
regards  distance  and  more  widely  still  as  regards  inter- 
communication. Difference  of  climate  and  local  condi- 
tions are  also  important  elements.  National  rivalries 
and  animosities  are  causes  of  isolation.  To  a  great  ex- 
tent, and  certainly  to  a  greater  extent  than  is  imagined  in 
North  America,  each  state  has  led  a  separate  existence. 
All  have  been  separated  from  the  mother  country  on 
account  of  their  remoteness,  lack  of  communication,  and 
want  of  mutual  sympathy.  All  have  been  aided  in  their 
material  advancement  by  foreign  capital  and  energy, 
but  in  those  intellectual  matters  that  concern  the  mother 

Students  and  the  Present  Missionary  Crisis,  Report  of  the 
Rochester  Student  Volunteer  Convention,  327f. 


86  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

tongue  each  nation  has  been  forced  to  march  alone.  All 
this  has  constituted  a  serious  handicap  in  the  matter 
of  school  texts. 

"If  the  entire  Spanish-speaking  world  with  its  75,000,- 
ooo  inhabitants  formed  an  iatellectual  unit,  it  would 
provide  a  public  that  would  appeal  to  talent  and  to  the 
publishing  industries.  If  even  the  Spanish- American 
countries,  with  their  more  than  50,000,000,  formed  such 
a  unit,  the  incentive  would  be  all-powerful.  .  .  . 

"Another  method,  however,  would  be  an  easier,  more 
logical,  more  rapid,  and  more  patriotic  solution  of  the 
difficulty,  viz.,  an  intellectual  union,  not  official,  but 
based  entirely  on  intellectual  sympathy,  between  the 
various  Spanish-speaking  communities.  Such  a  move- 
ment will  come  sooner  or  later.  Already  there  are  signs 
of  its  advent.  Recent  years  have  witnessed  a  decided 
rapprochement  between  Spain  and  the  Spanish  repub- 
lics. The  intellectual  life  of  the  two  branches  of  the 
Spanish  family  has  everything  to  gain  in  this  tendency, 
and  the  schools  would  be  among  the  first  to  profit.  The 
softening  of  national  asperities  in  Spanish  America,  the 
advance  in  means  of  rapid  intercommunication,  and  the 
remarkable  enthusiasm  in  favor  of  education,  now  so 
noticeable  in  almost  all  nations,  will  undoubtedly  bring 
about  a  community  of  interest  in  intellectual  matters." 

But  Dr.  Brandon  recognizes  that  " there  are  two  serious 
obstacles  to  an  early  consummation  of  this  program: 
first,  the  bitter  hostility  existing  between  some  countries 
on  account  of  acute  boundary  disputes ;  second,  the  fact 
that  the  most  progressive  nations  in  matters  of  general 
education  are  at  the  two  extremities  of  the  long  stretch 
of  Spanish-speaking  territory  that  extends  from  the 


EDUCATIONAL  87 

islands  and  the  Rio  Grande  on  the  north  to  Cape  Horn. 
However,  several  boundary  disputes  as  threatening  as 
any  that  remain  have  been  settled  amicably  in  recent 
years;  more  accurate  geographical  knowledge  will  make 
some  others  easier  of  solution ;  and  the  nations  are  learn- 
ing that  the  surest  aggrandizement  will  come  through 
internal  development  and  the  universal  education  of  their 
population."1 

8.  The    Press.      One    of    the    greatest    educational 
agencies  in  Latin  America  is  the  press.     Its  influence 
would  be  still  greater  if  the  percentage  of  literacy  could 
be  increased.    And  no  force  at  work  in  these  lands  ought 
more  zealously  to  strive  for  popular  education.    Some  of 
the  best  papers  published  on  the  western  hemisphere  are 
issued    in    Latin   America,    papers   like   the   Jornal   do 
Comer  do  of  Rio,  La  Prensa  of  Buenos  Aires  and  El 
Mercurlo  of  Santiago.    And  many  of  the  Latin- American 
republics  encourage  reading  and  printing  by  carrying  all 
printed  matter  free  in  the  mails. 

9.  Literature.    The  problem  of  clean,  helpful  litera- 
ture is  one  of  the  most  pressing  problems  in  Latin  Amer- 
ica.    "Old  Spain,"  says  Lord  Bryce,  "never  supplied  to 
her   colonies   through   books   anything   approaching   the 
volume  of  that  perennial  stream  of  instruction  and  stimu- 
lation which  English-speaking  writers  have  for  nearly 
four  centuries  supplied  to  those  who  can  read  English 
all  over  the  world,  and  which  France  has  likewise  sup- 
plied  to   all   who    can    read   her   language.      In    South 
America,  men  now  learn  French  in  increasing  numbers, 


1  United   State's  Bureau  of   Education  Bulletin,  1912,   No.  30, 
141-143- 


88          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

but  they  are  still  a  small  percentage  of  the  educated  popu- 
lation of  Spanish  America."1 

Dr.  Brandon  says  that  probably  more  than  half  of 
the  books  in  the  university  medical  libraries  are  French. 
And  the  book  stalls  are  full  of  French  fiction.  This 
fiction  is  of  the  most  pernicious  character  and  the  tone 
of  too  much  Latin- American  literary  production  in 
Spanish  during  the  nineteenth  century  is  set  forth  by 
Sr.  Calderon.  Among  its  notes  as  he  describes  them, 
some  of  the  most  frequent  phrases  are :  "restless  passion," 
"the  intoxicating  sensuality  of  the  tropics,"  "the  melan- 
choly of  the  flesh."  Dario's  verse  possesses  "the  sensu- 
ality of  a  faun."  Ricardo  Palma  "has  described  in  a 
sumptuous  style  the  life  of  all  Spanish  colonies,  devout 
and  sensual,"  with  subtle  irony  and  in  "joyous  and  some- 
what licentious  narrative."  The  tone  of  "decadent  art" 
prevails.  This  is  Calderon's  representation.  It  is  obvious 
that  the  Latin  Americans  like  ourselves  have  war  to  wage 
against  the  processes  of  rot  and  defilement  which  operate 
through  literature.  Not  only  do  more  Latin-American 
people  need  to  read  but  they  want  a  greater  abundance  of 
clean  and  wholesome  popular  literature. 

10.  Ideals.  Throughout  the  Latin-American  nations 
there  are  earnest  and  able  men  who  never  for  a  moment 
relinquish  the  highest  intellectual  and  moral  ideals  for 
their  people.  Surely  these  men  have  a  right  to  look  for 
sympathy  and  cooperation  to  the  men  of  Canada  and 
the  United  States  who  cannot  sustain  political  and  com- 
mercial relations  to  Latin  America  without  increased 
responsibility  also  for  its  moral  and  intellectual  advance- 
ment. 


1  South  America:  Observations  and  Impressions,  576. 


IV 
RELIGIOUS 

The  best  setting  forth  of  the  missionary  service  which 
the  churches  of  the  United  States  and  Canada  can  and 
ought  to  render  in  Latin  America,  and  of  the  manner 
and  spirit  in  which  this  service  should  be  extended  is 
found  in  the  Report  of  Commission  I  on  Survey  and 
Occupation,  and  the  Report  of  Commission  II  on  Mes- 
sage and  Method,  presented  at  the  Congress  on  Chris- 
tian Work  in  Latin  America,  held  at  Panama  in  Febru- 
ary, 1916. 

The  Report  of  Commission  I  dealt  first  with  "The 
Significance  of  Latin  America  to  the  Life  of  the  World,'' 
"i.  In  respect  to  culture ;  2.  In  natural  material  resources ; 
3.  In  domiciling  now  overcrowded  populations;  4.  As 
the  seat  of  rising  democracies;  5.  In  the  formation  of  a 
new  world  race  or  races."  The  report  then  proceeded  to 
consider 

I.  THE  CLAIMS  OF  PRESENT-DAY  LATIN  AMERICA  ON  THE 

MESSAGE  AND  SERVICE  OF  EVANGELICAL  CHRISTIANS 

AND  CHURCHES. 

We  cannot  do  better  in  this  chapter  than  summarize 
and  make  available  for  the  men  taking  these  studies  the 
material  of  this  Report.  What  are  these  claims? 

i.  Arising  from  Immigration  and  Commerce.  The 
facts  as  to  immigration  and  trade  have  already  been  pre- 
89 


90          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

sented.  What  moral  and  religious  obligations  do  they 
entail  ? 

"One  of  the  frightful  costs  of  migration  the  world  over 
relates  to  the  field  of  morals  and  religion.  If  it  be  some- 
times pointed  out  that  a  weakness  of  organized  Chris- 
tianity is  exposed  by  the  faithlessness  of  adherents  when 
away  from  its  authority  and  conventions,  the  remedy  is 
not  the  abandonment  of  institutions,  ordinances,  in- 
struction and  worship,  but  the  paralleling  of  immigrants 
to  the  ends  of  the  earth  with  the  forms  and  spirit  of 
Christianity  which  at  home  held  and  inspired  them. 

"This  is  the  place  to  pay  tribute  to  the  many  faithful 
men  and  women  from  foreign  lands  who  are  proving  in 
Latin  America  that  their  morals  and  faith  are  real  and 
abiding  and  not  the  creatures  of  custom,  climate  or 
convenience.  Nothing  less  than  glorious  are  the  pure 
domestic  circles,  the  family  altars,  the  volunteer  Sunday- 
schools,  the  unshakable  business  integrity,  the  dignified 
and  kindly  consideration  of  employees  and  business 
associates  which  mark  here  and  there  souls,  who,  like 
Abraham,  left  not  God  when  they  journeyed  to  the  lands 
of  strangers.  Full  recognition  must  likewise  be  given  to 
the  number  and  strength  of  the  temptations  that  over- 
whelm the  weaker  and  less  faithful.  All  the  evils  of  the 
lands  they  left  came  along  with  them  or  preceded  them. 
Everywhere  the  evils  of  a  new  land  are  more  in  evidence 
and  aggressive  than  are  the  good  and  restraining  influ- 
ences. In  actual  isolation  of  camp,  mine,  or  mill,  or  in 
the  yet  more  demoralizing  loneliness  of  a  great  alien  city, 
away  from  home,  where  no  one  that  counts  with  them 
will  know  and  where  nobody  seems  to  care — this  is  the 
stage  on  which  are  enacted  the  moral  tragedies  of  coloni- 


RELIGIOUS  91 

zation  and  commerce.  It  is  national  material  enrichment 
at  the  price  of  national  character,  for  the  stream  swirls 
back  and  bears  homeward  the  worst  it  found  and  helped 
to  create. 

"The  continent  of  Europe  and  the  Anglo-Saxon  race 
have  a  plain  duty  to  discharge  in  respect  to  the  moral 
welfare  of  Latin  America.  They  have  undoubtedly  con- 
ferred certain  great  blessings,  freely  and  gratefully  ac- 
knowledged by  the  beneficiaries." 

Moral  Consequence  of  Immigration.  "It  is  more  need- 
ful here  to  recount  the  liabilities  of  the  foreign  impact 
upon  these  populations.  The  scholarship  of  Europe, 
notably  France,  in  liberating  the  mind  has  maimed  the 
faith  of  thinking  Latin  America.  The  intemperance  of 
the  west  coast  of  South  America  and  of  Central  America 
is  not  entirely  Latin  or  Indian,  but  partly  foreign  in 
origin.  Some  of  it  represents  white  men  with  fire-water 
repeating  North  America's  ravaging  of  the  Indians.  .  .  . 
The  sordid  commercial  standards  which  too  many  foreign 
business  men  have  adopted  will  serve  long  to  keep  humble 
and  silent  their  observing  and  untempted  fellow  nationals. 
If  bribes  have  been  taken  by  Latins  they  have  been  given 
often  by  foreigners.  Where  industrial  injustice  is  en- 
trenched many  representatives  of  foreign  capital  also 
complacently  profit  by  it. 

"Whom  does  all  this  concern  in  the  home  lands  from 
which  these  destructive  influences  come?  Surely  all 
men  who  love  fairness  and  to  whom  this  knowledge 
comes.  The  situation  presents  a  familiar  phenomenon 
of  the  modern  world  wherever  there  are  confluent  civili- 
zations interacting  on  each  other  through  the  contacts 
of  trade,  ideas,  institutions,  habits,  and  personalities.  The 


92          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

closer  relationships  are  not  to  be  condemned  or  deplored. 
They  are  inevitable  and  will  be  multiplied  and  cemented 
by  mutual  consent.  The  duty  of  Christians  is  to  abate 
the  attendant  evils.  Common  honor  demands  that  wher- 
ever one  race  destroys  character  in  another,  it  shall  seek 
to  upbuild.  Where  one's  countrymen  exploit  he  must 
serve.  The  materials  of  one  society  are  bestowed  upon 
another  for  loss,  not  gain,  if  in  the  process  the  spirit 
and  inner  life  be  withheld.  The  character-building  forces 
of  nations  that  export  the  products  of  their  breweries 
and  distilleries  and  other  agencies  of  debauchery  may 
not  remain  insular  in  their  outreach.  While  others  press 
forward  with  their  commercialism  and  all  its  strain  upon 
integrity,  who  that  are  just  would  withhold  or  give  grudg- 
ingly the  tested  conserving  processes  in  their  possession 
by  which  corruptions  are  resisted  and  good  reinforced? 
When  neutral  or  evil  personalities  go  from  one  people  to 
another,  the  sending  forth  of  a  few  hundreds  embodying 
that  nation's  finest  spiritual  and  moral  sense  is  dictated 
by  the  consideration  of  national  self-respect." 

2.  Because  of  the  Imminent  Peril  to  Faith  Among 
Entire  Peoples.  "The  urgency  in  the  religious  condi- 
tion of  Latin  Americans  arises  out  of  the  impending 
collapse  of  their  traditional  Christian  faith  and  the  feeble- 
ness of  remedial  effort.  The  peril  is  imminent,  indeed 
well  advanced.  It  is  already  coextensive  with  the  in- 
tellectuals. Serious  as  is  that  fact  of  itself,  the  implica- 
tions and  sequences  of  it  are  as  appalling  as  they  are 
inevitable  unless  arrested.  Given  practically  universal 
unbelief  as  far  as  modern  learning  has  proceeded ;  popular 
education  progressing  rapidly  under  the  stronger  govern- 
ments and  avowed  to  be  the  program  of  all  the  govern- 


RELIGIOUS 


93 


ments;  the  dominant  religious  leaders  devoting  their 
energies  to  impeding  the  irresistible  currents  of  un- 
trammeled  learning  instead  of  Christianizing  them ;  given 
these,  and  to  all  Christians  who  know  the  facts  and  their 
significance,  who  care  about  them,  and  whose  faith  has 
life,  power,  and  appeal  to  meet  such  a  crisis,  the  call 
comprehends  every  element  of  obligation  and  immediacy. 

"The  rise  of  modern  learning  in  the  nineteenth  century 
brought  a  crisis  upon  the  religious  world,  Christendom 
not  excepted.  Christian  thought  has  been  facing  a  new 
rationalism,  materialism,  and  pessimism  in  every  form  of 
subtlety  and  virulence.  In  so  far  as  the  church  is  found 
or  proves  herself  willing  to  become  ethically  solvent, 
politically  unallianced,  and  intellectually  honest,  Christian 
faith  and  works  are  emerging  more  vital  and  more  com- 
pelling, purified  and  fortified  by  the  tests.  Wherever 
she  condones  and  continues  disposed  to  cling  to  decadent 
morals,  identifies  her  interests  with  absolutism  and 
oppression,  and  flouts  her  scholars,  however  reverent, 
students  and  other  possessors  of  the  scientific  spirit  and 
method  are  either  enmeshed  by  doubt  or  openly  avow 
their  unbelief." 

The  Roman  Church  Static.  "To  maintain  perspective 
here,  it  must  be  taken  into  account  that  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic Church  in  Latin  America  profited  little  from  the 
Reformation,  being  the  projection  of  national  bodies  that 
reacted  from  the  prospect  of  religious  freedom  to  the 
excesses  of  the  Inquisition.  Intellectually,  most  of  the 
clergy  languish  in  the  conceptions  of  the  middle  ages. 
Even  the  most  moderate  wing  of  the  loyal  modernist 
movement  among  European  Roman  Catholics  has  failed 
to  gain  a  hearing  either  from  laity  or  clergy,  so  that  the 


94  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

thinking  men  are  without  any  program  to  point  the 
for  them  to  be  at  once  Christians  and  yet  true  to  the 
laws  of  the  mind  and  to  the  accepted  facts  of  modern 
knowledge  with  which  their  best  institutions  of  higher 
learning  are  abreast. 

"Any  strength,  therefore,  of  organized  Christianity  in 
learned  Latin  America  lies  for  the  most  part  entirely 
outside  the  personal  allegiances  which  spring  from  faith 
in  God,  the  lordship  and  saviorhood  of  Jesus  Christ,  a 
love'  of  the  church,  and  the  ministry  to  human  need 
as  citizens  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  As  a  political  insti- 
tution, the  Roman  Catholic  Church  is  generally  found 
in  league  with  what  are  now  remnants  or  successors  of 
the  old  Spanish  oligarchies.  In  about  half  the  republics 
this  alliance  is  in  control  but  is  hotly  contested,  and 
decade  by  decade,  with  the  advance  of  education  and 
other  liberal  policies,  it  is  forced  to  yield  ground.  Politi- 
cal expediency,  class  interest  and  inherited  religious 
sentiment  are  still  powerful  in  holding  many  to  outward 
form  and  obedience  after  vital  faith  and  love  have  de- 
parted or  indeed  where  they  never  existed.  Moreover, 
with  the  loyalty  of  the  women  generally  unshaken, 
Roman  Catholicism  remains  the  axis  on  which  turns  the 
elite  social  order  in  most  of  the  countries.  These  domestic 
and  related  bonds  retain  many  in  polite  conformity. 
Underneath  the  entire  structure  of  religion,  however, 
beating  against  the  foundations  are  tides  of  disapproval 
ranging  in  degree  from  lack  of  confidence,  through  in- 
difference, .to  the  most  violent  repudiation  of  the  validity 
of  Christianity  in  all  its  forms  and  manifestations. 

"There  are  jour  groups  to  be  borne  in  mind,  varying 
numerically  in  proportion  to  each  other  in  the  several 


RELIGIOUS  .  95 

countries.  No  group  is  absent  from  any  one.  These  are ; 
(i)  a  violent  anticlerical  party,  many  of  whom  carry 
their  opposition  to  religion  of  every  form;  (2)  the  more 
or  less  well-reasoned  atheists  and  skeptics  who  look  in- 
dulgently upon  religion  as  harmless  for  women  and  for 
the  lower  classes,  but  who  are  themselves  indifferent  to 
its  claims  upon  them  personally;  (3)  the  dissatisfied,  if 
not  disillusioned,  and  groping  companies  of  souls  who 
soon  pass  on  to  cynicism  and  hardness  of  heart ;  (4) 
those  whose  period  of  doubt  and  breaking  away  is  ahead 
of  them  as  they  are  overtaken  by  free  education.  Al- 
ready large  defections  have  proceeded  beyond  the  scholar 
class,  and  the  turning  to  various  cults  has  begun.  The 
undermining  of  belief  proceeding  on  a  national  scale  in 
every  division  of  the  field  is  patent  to  all  observers/' 

3.  Because  Commissioned  to  Carry  the  Gospel  to 
Unevangelized  Populations.     "Large  numbers  of  the 
native  Indians  and  Negro  ex-slave  descendants  in  given 
sections  of  Latin  America  are  pagan,  in  some  areas  with- 
out any  contact  whatever  with  Christianity,  and  in  many 
others  with  too  little  to  affect  appreciably  either  their 
religious  conceptions,  their  character,  or  their  low  eco- 
nomic state.    They  constitute  a  field  of  pure  missionary 
endeavor  as  apostolically  conceived,  which  no  body  of 
Christians  can  ignore  who  accept  responsibility  for  the 
world's  evangelization.     Scarcely  less  appealing  are  the 
spiritual  needs  of  even  more  numerous  bodies  of  peoples 
who  are  without  any  commensurate  means  for  entrance 
upon  Christian  discipleship,  instruction,  and  growth." 

4.  In  Consideration  of  the  Contributions  of  Spiritual 
Freedom  to  Individual  and  National  Character.    "The 
progressive  rapprochements  of  many  of  the  great  Chris- 


96          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

tian  communions  are  teaching  this  generation  that  isola- 
tion and  aloofness  are  inimical  to  spiritual  f ruitfulness ; 
and  also  that  each  body  has  some  God-given  contribution 
to  make  in  the  discovery  and  appropriation  by  all  of  the 
Christian  message  and  ideal  in  their  fullness.  By  as  much 
as  faithful  adherents  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church, 
obedient  to  her  sense  of  mission,  establish  her  institutions 
and  minister  side  by  side  with  those  of  other  communions 
on  the  continent  of  Europe,  in  the  British  Isles,  in  North 
America  and  elsewhere,  so  millions  of  Christians  of  the 
other  communions  conceive  that  they  may  not  withhold 
from  Latin  America,  or  from  any  other  part  of  the 
world,  those  aspects  of  Christian  truth  and  life  which 
have  been  revealed  to  them  as  among  the  supreme  bless- 
ings of  the  faith.  Without  undertaking  to  exhaust  the 
category,  these  are  named  as  obligations  heavily  laid 
upon  evangelical  Christians  in  behalf  of  the  whole  world: 
the  establishment  of  intellectual  freedom;  the  opening, 
circulation  and  study  of  the  Scriptures;  the  recognition 
of  the  right  and  value  of  democracy  in  ecclesiastical 
government.  .  .  . 

"Liberty  of  conscience  and  opinion,  moreover,  is  the 
mother  of  toleration  and  mutual  respect,  without  the 
sacrifice  of  conviction  or  of  principle.  There  can  be 
differences  and  even  opposition  without  bitterness. 
Evangelical  Christianity,  though  not  yet  without  bigots, 
has  sufficiently  learned  the  lessons  of  history,  many  of 
them  painful,  to  throw  the  preponderance  of  its  strength 
into  the  scale  for  freedom  of  intellect  and  conscience. 
It  seeks  this  boon  for  Latin  America  in  good  faith,  be- 
lieving that  the  acceptance  and  observance  of  the  princi- 
ple by  all  communions  in  those  lands  would  serve  there 


RELIGIOUS  97 

\ 

as  elsewhere  the  cause  of  true  religion  and  the  related 
interests  of  humanity  far  better  than  do  the  voice  of 
authority  and  the  machinery  of  suppression." 

Latin-American  Testimony.  "Latin  Americans,  liter- 
ate and  unlearned  alike,  are  practically  cut  off  from  this 
moral  and  spiritual  fountain.  The  earnest  educator, 
statesman,  and  others  in  public  and  private  life  condemn, 
deplore,  and  exhort  in  the  presence  of  a  situation  felt 
to  be  deplorable.  In  El  Sur,  of  Arequipa  (Peru), 
November  14,  1914,  in  an  article  headed  'Ruin/  the 
writer  says :  That  which  cannot  be  cured,  and  which  fore- 
shadows death  is  moral  failure.  And  this  is  the  evil  of 
this  country.  .  .  .  We  breathe  a  fetid  atmosphere  and 
are  not  sickened.  The  life  of  the  country  is  poisoned, 
and  the  country  needs  a  life  purification.  In  the  state  in 
which  we  are,  the  passing  of  the  years  does  not  change 
men,  it  only  accentuates  the  evil.  A  purging  and  a  strug- 
gle are  absolutely  necessary/  The  vice-rector  of  La 
Plata  University,  Argentina,  in  his  opening  address  of 
the  college  year,  called  upon  the  university  to  recognize 
its  obligation  to  develop  character  in  the  young  men  who 
pass  through  its  halls.  'It  is  with  great  sadness  that  I 
witness  the  steady  decrease  in  the  number  of  unselfish, 
idealistic,  genuine  men ;  how  engulfing  the  tide  of  selfish- 
ness, of  rebellion,  of  indiscipline  and  of  insatiable  ambi- 
tion; impunity  so  commonly  supplants  justice  that  I  fear 
for  the  spiritual  future  of  the  land  of  my  children,  unless 
we  make  haste  to  remedy  the  great  evil,  which  is  disre- 
gard for  the  noble,  and  the  great  and  unmeasured  lust 
for  material  riches/ 

"This  man  who  knows  what  he  wants,  but  knows  not 
how  to  get  it,  closed  with  the  characteristically  pessimistic 


98          THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

note  of  almost  all  South  Americans  of  high  ideals.  He 
quoted  from  Fogazzaro's  The  Saint,  as  follows:  There 
are  men  who  believe  they  disbelieve  in  God  and  who, 
when  sickness  and  death  approach,  say,  "Such  is  the 
law  of  life;  such  is  nature,  such  is  the  order  of  the  uni- 
verse. Let  us  bow  the  head,  accept  without  a  murmur, 
and  go  on  complying  with  our  duty." '  'Gentlemen/ 
said  the  rector  to  his  faculty,  'such  men  let  us  form  not 
only  in  the  University  of  La  Plata,  but  in  the  great,  com- 
plex university  of  Argentina/  It  is  pathetic  that  such 
men  know  not  the  way.  It  is  a  call  in  the  dark — but 
is  an  increasing  loud  call,  an  increasing  earnest  call,  a 
call  that  honestly  wishes  light.  God  hears  that  call  and 
will  not  be  long  in  answering  unless  men  who  know  the 
way  out  are  culpably  slothful." 

Spiritual  Famine.  "These  are  the  unfailing  signs  of 
spiritual  famine  to  be  observed  universally  wherever 
there  is  neglect  of  the  Bible.  Let  there  be  a  generous 
distribution  and  a  wide  use  of  the  Scriptures  from  Mexico 
to  the  Straits  of  Magellan,  and  a  corresponding  rise  in 
individual  and  collective  conscience  and  volitional  power 
will  be  registered  in  a  generation.  Immanuel  Kant  wrote : 
'The  existence  of  the  Bible  as  a  book  for  the  people  is 
the  greatest  benefit  which  the  human  race  has  ever  ex- 
perienced/ Millions  of  evangelical  Christians  nourished 
on  the  Bible  know  this  to  be  true.  They  will  be  false 
to  themselves  and  will  fail  in  a  solemn  trust  if  they 
do  not  in  humility  and  faithfulness  declare  and  reveal 
the  inexhaustible  sources  to  whomsoever  these  remain 
undiscovered.  .  .  . 

"Latin  Americans,  too,  will  waken  to  new  and  vigorous 
religious  life  when  both  the  rights  and  obligations  of  free 


RELIGIOUS 


99 


disciples  of  Jesus  are  offered  them.  They  are  charged 
with  indifference  to  the  interests  of  religion.  Is  this 
surprising?  When  have  their  convictions  concerning 
religion  been  respected,  or  their  opinions  sought  ?  They 
are  said  to  be  undependable  in  voluntary  Christian  serv- 
ice. No  school  of  experience  has  been  in  existence  to 
call  forth  and  to  develop  responsibility  in  the  individual. 
The  Inquisition  was  not  calculated  to  stimulate  inde- 
pendence and  initiative.  Even  capable  recruits  for  the 
national  clergy  have  all  but  ceased  to  come  forward  save 
in  countries  like  Chile,  where  ultr^montanism  was  re- 
sisted with  considerable  success.  Generations  forced  to 
stagnating  conformity  cannot  be  expected  to  flower  with 
spontaneity  into  self-reliant  and  progressive  Christians. 
The  journey  is  a  long  one  from  blindly  obeying  human 
spiritual  authority  to  full  citizenship  in  a  Christian 
democracy.  Halting  steps  and  even  helplessness  are 
certain  to  mark  the  early  stages,  but  once  accomplished 
on  the  part  of  substantial  numbers,  a  new  transforming 
order  of  society  will  appear  in  the  life  of  these  nations, 
conscious  and  rejoicing  in  their  call,  'Not  to  be  minis- 
tered unto  but  to  minister/  ' 

5.  For  the  Interchange  of  Spirit,  Principle  and  Meth- 
ods in  the  Solution  of  Social  Problems.  "The  un- 
selfish, patriotic  men  and  women  of  Europe  and  of  both 
Americas,  in  public  and  in  private  capacities,  are  hard 
pressed  by  similar  tasks  of  social  amelioration  and  of 
moral  regeneration  confronting  them.  The  enlightened 
peoples  of  the  world  are  sharing  with  one  another 
acquired  knowledge,  experience,  leadership,  and  financial 
assistance  in  the  advancement  of  health,  education, 
character,  and  other  fruits  of  Christian  civilization.  Such 


ioo         THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

interchange  should  increasingly  characterize  the  relations 
between  Latin  America  and  the  Anglo-Saxon-Teutonic 
nations.  Human  suffering,  ignorance,  greed,  and  lust 
are  not  limited  to  national  or  provincial  boundaries. 
'What  an  Italian  surgeon  or  a  German  scientist  discovers 
to-day  is  applied  to-morrow  in  the  world's  hospitals  and 
laboratories.  When  a  Brazilian  aeronaut  contributes  to 
the  conquest  of  the  air  or  an  Argentine  statesman  adds 
a  ne.w  doctrine  to  the  international  code,  civilization  ac- 
knowledges itself  debtor.  The  time  has  come  for  free 
trade  in  moral  resdurces.  This  is  a  plea  for  an  inter- 
national consciousness  to  assert  itself  against  Phariseeism 
when  a  sister  nation's  character  is  reviewed  and  against 
injured  pride  when  the  light  is  turned  on  at  home/  y> 

There  is  a  field  for  such  cooperation  in  education, 
especially  the  education  of  the  masses  of  the  people. 
"The  field  for  cooperation  in  health,  hygiene,  and  sanita- 
tion is  equally  extensive.  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  educa- 
tion on  these  matters  of  life  and  death  and  even  medical 
relief  can  humanely  be  withheld  from  large  populations 
where  the  facilities  to  prevent  and  cure  disease  are  alike 
inadequate  and  often  absent  altogether.  .  .  . 

"The  call  to  advance  preventive  medicine  by  education, 
example,  and  influence  is  urgent.  It  is  hardly  conceiv- 
able that  intelligent  service  on  the  part  of  foreign  Chris- 
tians would  not  be  welcomed  by  every  official  and  citizen 
interested  in  the  promotion  of  playgrounds,  better  hous- 
ing, sanitation,  and  in  antituberculosis  and  kindred  move- 
ments. If  barriers  now  exist,  a  better  understanding, 
approach,  and  working  basis  should  be  contemplated." 

Social  Hygiene.  "Societies  to  combat  intemperance, 
social  vice,  Indian  exploitation,  and  other  deeply-seated 


RELIGIOUS  101 

evils  are  scarcely  more  than  projected.  .  t  .  With 
respect  to  sex  education  and  antivice  regulations  Latin 
America  has  yet  to  travel  nearly  the  entire  distance  to 
be  abreast  of  contemporary  Christian  sentiment,  social 
science,  and  enlightened  procedure.  Full  credit  is  here 
given  to  the  first  steps  taken  forward,  the  more  signifi- 
cant because  so  isolated  and  therefore  courageous.  .  .  . 
Here  and  there  medical  men  are  being  heard  and  are 
appearing  in  print  and  supporting  the  continent  life  as 
consistent  with  health  and  virility.  For  generations  the 
youth  have  been  instructed  to  the  contrary,  as  indeed 
most  of  them  are  still.  The  double  standard  of  morality 
for  men  and  women  is  generally  accepted  by  both  sexes. 
The  great  municipalities  still  put  their  faith  in  segrega- 
tion, police  licenses,  medical  inspection,  and  the  other 
futile  measures  against  the  evils  of  prostitution  now  being 
repudiated  and  abandoned  on  the  Continent,  in  Great 
Britain  and  elsewhere  as  both  unchristian  and  contribu- 
tory to  the  harm  and  misery  it  is  desired  to  remove.  .  .  . 
Along  this  whole  battle  line  all  informed  lovers  and 
champions  of  the  human  race  must  offer  united  resis- 
tance without  cavil  or  false  pride.  The  aggregate  wis- 
dom and  power  of  all  are  none  too  strong  to  cope  suc- 
cessfully with  the  league  of  destructive  forces  grouped 
about  the  social  evil.  Its  international  character  calls 
for  the  closest  cooperation  between  the  leaders  in  moral 
reform  in  Latin  America,  Europe,  and  the  United  States. 
"To  the  social  problems  enumerated  above  may  be 
added  such  others  as  child  labor,  the  oppression  and 
neglect  of  the  poor,  inequitable  taxation,  class  govern- 
ment, the  evils  of  monopolies,  special  privileges,  and  un- 
fair labor  conditions.  All  these  problems  must  be  faced 


102         THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

couragequsly  in  the  light  of  Christian  principles.  But 
so  far  in  Latin  America  the  Roman  Church  has  con- 
tributed little  or  no  practical  help  toward  their  solution. 
Nevertheless-,  there  are  to  be  found  here  and  there  earnest 
men,  of  liberal  tendencies,  who,  for  patriotic  and  humani- 
tarian reasons,  are  striving  for  the  betterment  of  their 
country.  They  are  the  friends  of  education,  and  realize 
that  character  is  the  true  basis  of  national  strength  Does 
not  the  welcome  that  such  men  are  prepared  to  ex- 
tend to  the  forces  which  develop  character,  constitute 
a  golden  opportunity  for  the  evangelical  church  in  Latin 
America?"1 

A  Representative  Voice.  One  of  the  most  striking 
addresses  at  the  Panama  Congress  was  made  by  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  Judge  Emilio  del 
Toro  of  Porto  Rico.  His  testimony  and  appeal  were 
both  illustrative  and  representative.  After  speaking  of 
the  influence  of  religious  liberty  and  of  the  open  Bible 
in  the  United  States,  Judge  del  Toro  went  on: 

"Latin  America  is  coming  out  into  the  life  of  civiliza- 
tion with  a  different  lot.  The  seeds  of  Christianity  sown 
since  the  times  of  the  colonizers  have  produced  their 
fruits,  and  wherever  there  has  been  the  most  liberty  there 
its  mission  has  become  the  noblest  in  practise.  On  the 
boundaries  between  Chile  and  Argentine,  two  of  those 
American  nations  of  Spanish  origin  which  have  attained 
the-  highest  civilization,  the  Christ  of  the  Andes,  with 
his  open  arms  a  symbol  of  peace  and  love,  shows  to  the 
world  how  Christians  settle  their  disputes.  Besides,  the 
religious  life  of  the  Spanish- American  countries  has  been 


lReport  of  Commission  I  to  the  Panama  Congress,  22-49. 


RELIGIOUS  103 

characterized  by  the  almost  absolute  predominance  of 
the  Catholic  Church ;  and  in  my  judgment  the  same  benef- 
icent influence  which  Catholicism  has  exercised  in  the 
development  of  its  civilization  would  have  been  greater 
had  it  been  obliged  to  contend  face  to  face  from  the 
earliest  times  with  a  vigorous  Protestant  movement. 

"Until  a  few  years  ago,  the  Catholic  Church  was,  in 
my  native  island,  Porto  Rico,  the  state  religion.  Among 
the  public  expenditures  those  for  worship  were  con- 
spicuous. The  influence  of  the  clergy  extended  every- 
where. And  what  was  the  result,  after  four  centuries  of 
abundant  opportunities?  A  people  for  the  most  part 
indifferent  or  unbelieving. 

"There  took  place  a  change  of  regime.  The  church 
was  separated  from  the  state.  A  struggle  began  under 
the  protection  of  the  free  institutions  of  North  America, 
established  in  the  island;  Presbyterians,  Methodists, 
Lutherans,  Baptists,  Episcopalians  began  their  work. 
Faint-hearted  Catholic  priests,  accustomed  to  the  enjoy- 
ment of  special  privileges,  descried  the  ruin  of  their 
church.  But  it  was  not  so.  The  spirit  of  the  North 
entered  into  her  and  men  accustomed  to  a  life  of  freedom 
gave  her  a  new  impetus.  And  to-day,  separated  from 
the  state,  sustained  by  herself,  she  is  realizing  a  nobler 
and  more  Christian  mission  than  in  the  time  when  her 
power  was  absolute. 

"Those  who  love  the  progress  of  the  nations,  those 
who  study  history  dispassionately,  those  who  have  faith 
in  the  improvement  of  mankind,  cannot  but  see  with 
deep  sympathy  that  the  reformation  is  spreading,  that 
free  investigation  opens  broader  horizons  to  the  human 
spirit,  that  Christianity,  preached  and  interpreted  by 


104        THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

all,  disseminates  its  beneficent  influence  and  raises  the 
level  of  society. 

"Porto  Rico  is  a  case  in  point  and  is  conclusive  evidence 
to  me  of  the  results  which  will  be  obtained  in  all  of 
Latin  America  from  initiating  and  sustaining  a  vigorous 
and  altruistic  Protestant  movement.  Not  only  will  reli- 
gious feeling  grow ;  not  only  will  Christianity  win  con- 
verts; not  only  will  more  prayer  be  offered  in  spirit 
and  in  truth  by  many  men;  not  only  will  it  redound  in 
good  to  the  Catholic  Church  itself,  but  the  influence  of 
Christianity  in  the  life  of  the  Spanish-American  democ- 
racies will  be  greatly  multiplied.  There  is  something 
which  lives  in  us  which  is  part  of  our  very  being,  and 
it  is  the  heritage  received  from  our  ancestors.  And 
wherever  the  reformation  goes,  wherever  the  Protestant 
minister  accomplishes  his  mission,  there  it  will  go,  there 
that  heritage  of  so  many  generations  of  peoples  of  the 
North  who  strove  for  the  freedom  of  many  will  act  and 
react.  In  his  relations  with  the  community,  in  his  judg- 
ments on  public  affairs,  in  the  direction  of  his  own  insti- 
tutions, in  his  administration  of  charity,  in  his  schools 
and  hospitals,  in  his  ideas  of  the  uplift  of  the  masses  and 
of  the  dignity  of  labor,  in  his  spirit  of  tolerance,  the 
minister,  if  he  is  a  legitimate  representative  of  Christian 
civilization,  will  be  an  inspiration  to  the  people."1 

II.  AN  OPEN  DOOR 

The  Latin-American  nations  have  opened  the  doors 
wide  for  all  sincere,  friendly,  and  sympathetic  assistance. 
There  was  a  time  when  they  were  closed,  when  religious 


xThe  Panama  Star  and  Herald,  Feb.  17,  1916. 


RELIGIOUS  IOS 

liberty  was  denied,  but  one  by  one  the  various  republics, 
even  where  they  still  suppdrt  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
as  the  state  church,  have  admitted  or  even  welcomed  and 
invited  the  forces  of  the  evangelical  churches. 

Religious  Toleration.  "Full  recognition  of  re- 
ligious liberty  is  now  accorded  either  by  the  fundamental 
law  or  through  its  liberal  interpretation  by  all  the  repub- 
lics of  the  western  hemisphere.  The  last  to  grant  this 
is  Peru.  The  fourth  article  of  the  constitution  of  Peru 
reads:  The  religion  of  the  state  is  the  Roman  Catholic 
Apostolic ;  the  state  protects  it,  and  does  not  permit  the 
public  exercise  of  any  other/  A  bill  to  remove  the  last 
clause  passed  both  houses  of  Congress  of  1913.  To  be 
effective  it  required  the  approval  of  the  legislature  of 
1914.  This  was  secured  in  the  Senate,  but  failed  to  reach 
a  vote  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  under  heavy  political, 
social,  and  even  domestic  pressure,  until  November,  1915, 
when  the  measure  was  hurriedly  called  up  and  passed  by 
an  overwhelming  majority.  The  president  permitted  it 
to  become  law  by  expiration  of  time.  The  law  has  not 
permitted  the  erection  of  buildings  or  ownership  of 
property  for  purposes  of  worship  unrecognized  by  the 
state.  Permission  to  build  the  Anglo-American  church 
in  Lima  was  obtained  only  under  pressure  by  the  minis- 
ters of  Great  Britain,  Germany,  and  the  United  States, 
it  being  stipulated  that  the  building  must  convey  no  out- 
ward appearance  of  a  church.  Nevertheless,  men  of 
liberal  tendencies  have  held  important  positions  under 
the  government,  which,  at  least  on  one  occasion,  was 
willing  to  indemnify  evangelical  workers  for  losses  suf- 
fered. Both  presidents  and  cabinet  ministers  have  sus- 
tained colporteurs  in  the  right  to  sell  Bibles. 


io6        THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

"In  the  other  countries  practical  religious  freedom  is 
in  effect.  Uniform  testimony  is  born  to  the  fidelity  with 
which  the  higher  officials  of  the  governments  administer 
the  guaranties  of  religious  freedom.  Local  authorities 
in  the  more  remote  and  less  advanced  regions  are  some- 
times found  lending  themselves  and  their  officers  to 
overt  persecution  and  even  to  violence.  In  other  areas 
the  clergy  privately  are  more  powerful  than  the  local 
government  and  are  able  to  incite  illegal  opposition  and 
to  protect  offenders  until  the  higher  jurisdictions  are 
reached.  Weapons  of  social  ostracism,  business  boycott, 
and  political  discrimination  are  still  widely  employed 
against  non-conforming  believers.  Unhappily,  few,  if 
any  peoples  have  not  in  their  past  history  yielded  to  such 
unchristian,  undemocratic  passions  and  misguided  zeal. 
Many  are  not  yet  guiltless.  The  extent  of  the  abandon- 
ment of  these  practises  marks  the  displacing  of  fanaticism 
and  ignorance  by  the  graces  of  true  disciples  of  Jesus." 

Religious  Equality  Still  Lacking.  "Religious  lib- 
erty, however,  must  not  here  be  confused  or  identified 
with  religious  equality.  On  this  latter  aspect  of  the  case 
there  is  much  more  to  be  recorded.  In  several  countries 
non-Catholics  are  under  certain  disabilities.  Support  of 
the  church  establishment  is  imposed  upon  all  taxpayers 
alike  save  in  Mexico,  Bolivia,  and  Cuba,  where  separa- 
tion from  the  state  has  taken  place.  In  Colombia,  chil- 
dren may  not  attend  the  public  schools  who  absent  them- 
selves from  the  services  of  the  church.  The  ecclesiastical 
court  is  above  the  civil  courts,  and  any  party  to  a  non- 
Roman  Catholic  marriage  can  at  any  time  get  it  annulled 
and  be  remarried  in  that  church.  Control  of  hospitals 
by  nuns  in  Ecuador  is  a  decided  limitation  of  the  liberty 


RELIGIOUS  107 

of  needy  persons.  These  are  frequently  put  out  of  the 
hospital  on  their  refusal  to  receive  the  ministrations  of 
the  priest.  Chileans  and  Peruvians  report  similar  meas- 
ures of  compulsory  confession."1 

The  freedom  already  accorded  must  be  used,  that  the 
people  may  enter  into  a  yet  larger  freedom. 

III.  IN  WHAT  MANNER  AND  SPIRIT  SHOULD  THIS  CALL 
BE  MET? 

Commission  II,  of  the  Panama  Congress,  on  Method 
and  Message,  dealt  with  this  question.  The  introduction 
of  its  report  illustrated  the  spirit  which  it  advocated  in 
answer : 

The  Universality  of  Religion.  "The  commission 
has  assumed  that  in  the  sphere  of  fundamental  religious 
values — the  spiritual,  intellectual,  and  social  needs  whose 
satisfaction  has  to  do  with  man's  right  relations  to  God 
and  to  his  fellow-man,  and  with  the  highest  welfare  of 
nations — iatin  America  does  not  differ  from  North 
America,  or  from  any  other  land  whether  nominally 
Christian  or  non-Christian,  however  apparent  may  be  the 
diversities  in  national  temperament,  historical  experience, 
present  status,  and  external  forms  of  the  respective  civili- 
zations. Beside  this  recognition  of  the  identity  in  all 
lands  of  fundamental  religious  needs  growing  out  of 
common  humanity  and  brotherhood,  the  Commission 
would  urge  the  validity  of  the  corresponding  Christian 
conviction  that  the  gospel  of  Christ  is  universally  identi- 
cal in  its  essential  truths  and  in  its  power  to  meet  the 
deepest  needs  of  the  soul.  The  gospel  for  Latin  Amer- 

*Report  of  Commission  I  to  the  Panama  Congress,  54,  55- 


io8        THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

ica,  as  for  all  the  world,  is  a  message  of  life — sufficient, 
abundant,  inexhaustible.  Furthermore,  the  commission 
conceives  that  the  right  and  only  function,  as  well  as 
the  unescapable  obligation,  of  the  evangelical  churches 
in  Latin  America,  as  elsewhere,  is  faithfully  to  proclaim, 
to  interpret  and  to  practise  the  Christian  gospel  in  its 
purity  and  fullness,  in  order  to  secure  its  voluntary 
acceptance  by  those  who  have  not  received  it  and  to 
seek  the  application  of  its  principles  and  the  communica- 
tion of  its  spirit  to  individual,  social,  and  national  life." 

The  Religious  Question  Paramount.  "The  timeli- 
ness of  the  theme  of  this  commission  is  sufficiently  indi- 
cated by  mention  of  the  wide-spread  solicitude  concern- 
ing the  religious  life  of  Latin  America,  which,  in  the 
last  few  years,  has  emerged  in  many  parts  of  the  Chris- 
tian world,  a  solicitude  to  which  the  strongest  expression 
has  been  given  by  religious  leaders,  both  Roman  Catholic 
and  Protestant,  who  are  in  immediate  contact  with  the 
special  problems  existent  in  the  republics.  Scarcely  less 
keen — despite  much  indifference  to  religious  matters  on 
the  part  of  the  educated  classes— has  been  the  interest 
evinced  by  eminent  patriots,  statesmen,  and  scholars, 
especially  in  South  America,  who,  while  without  a  posi- 
tive religious  message  themselves,  are  nevertheless  con- 
cerned as  to  the  content  and  quality  of  the  inner  life  of 
their  people,  and  as  to  the  religious  goal  to  which  the 
masses  are  tending.  .  .  . 

"The  religious  question  not  only  confronts  the  Latin- 
American  peoples  to-day,  emerging  as  a  vital  issue  from 
the  experiences  of  the  past;  it  is  discerned  also  as  an  all- 
important  element  in  the  future  national  prosperity.  As 
religion  is  the  soul  of  history,  the  character  of  the  com- 


RELIGIOUS  109 

ing  development  of  Latin  civilization  depends  in  supreme 
degree  upon  the  quality  of  its  moral  and  spiritual  life. 
Only  upon  a  sound  religious  basis  can  the  Latin  charac- 
ter and  the  Latin  culture  rise  to  their  full  possibilities 
and  fulfil  their  potential  mission  in  the  western  hemi- 
sphere. 

"At  the  present  time  when  South  America  stands  on 
tiptoe,  facing  a  new  industrial  era  and  preparing  to 
expand  in  vast  commercial  enterprises,  when  all  the  re- 
publics are  responding  to  the  enlarging  impulses  of 
Pan- Americanism ;  when  Mexico  is  struggling  through 
revolution  to  a  larger  and  purer  freedom;  when  Central 
America  and  the  Antilles  are  feeling  the  thrill  of  a  livelier 
destiny  by  the  opening  of  the  Panama  Canal;  when  that 
great  avenue  of  the  seas,  which,  while  it  cuts  the  narrow 
bond  that  joined  the  two  continents,  thereby  unites  them 
by  the  more  enduring  ties  of  mutual  exchange  in  com- 
modities and  ideals,  of  international  sympathy  and  friend- 
ship, of  common  purpose  and  of  the  common  mission 
of  Christian  democracy — at  such  a  time  no  question  could 
be  more  important  than  this :  In  order  that  the  churches 
may  adjust  themselves  to  the  new  day  and  be  an  up- 
lifting and  guiding  force  in  spiritual  things,  what  shall 
be  the  message  and  the  method  of  their  ministry?" 

Factors  Influencing  Evangelical  Methods.  The 
Report  sets  forth  the  "relevant  facts  in  Latin-American 
civilization"  which  must  be  in  view  in  considering  the 
method  of  help.  It  singles  out  (i)  racial  complexity,  (2) 
the  Latin  spirit,  (3)  the  religious  inheritance,  (4)  politi- 
cal isolation,  and  (5)  democratic  idealism. 

Of  the  religious  inheritance  it  is  said:  "Abundant 
evidence  establishes  the  fact  that  the  vast  statistical  mem- 


no         THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

bership  of  the  census  reports  is  largely  nominal  and 
superficial.  That  there  are  immense  and  growing  defec- 
tions from  the  Roman  Church,  not  only  in  inward  con- 
viction and  sympathy,  but  in  outward  allegiance  and 
conformity,  is  patent  beyond  contradiction  in  every  Latin- 
American  land.  Multitudes,  having  become  alienated 
from  the  Roman  Church,  are  contemptuous  or  antago- 
nistic toward  all  religion;  still  vaster  multitudes  have 
drifted  into  utter  indifference  regarding  the  teachings  of 
Roman  Catholicism,  while  yielding  prudential  compliance 
with  its  forms  and  customs. 

"Scientific  candor  based  on  indisputable  testimony 
from  both  Roman  Catholic  and  Protestant  sources  com- 
pels the  statement  that  in  the  Roman  Church,  Latin 
America  has  inherited  an  institution  which,  though  still 
influential,  is  rapidly  declining  in  power.  With  notable 
exceptions  its  priesthood  is  discredited  by  the  thinking 
classes.  Its  moral  life  is  weak  and  its  spiritual  witness 
faint.  At  the  present  time  it  is  giving  the  people  neither 
the  Bible,  nor  the  gospel,  nor  the  intellectual  guidance, 
nor  the  moral  dynamic,  nor  the  social  uplift  which  they 
need.  It  is  weighted  with  medievalism  and  other  non- 
Christian  accretions."1 

Divorce  of  Religion  from  Practise.  Lord  Bryce  has 
set  forth  temperately  the  judgment  which  he  formed 
after  years  of  acquaintance  with  Latin  America  and  his 
personal  visit:  "Another  fact  strikes  the  traveler  with 
surprise.  Both  the  intellectual  life  and  the  ethical  stand- 
ards of  conduct  of  these  countries  seem  to  be  entirely 
divorced  from  religion.  The  women  are  almost  uni- 


lReport  of  Commission  II  to  the  Panama  Congress,  7-9,  17,  18. 


RELIGIOUS  in 

versally  'practising'  Catholics,  and  so  are  the  peasantry, 
though  the  Christianity  of  the  Indians  bears  only  a  dis- 
tant resemblance  to  that  of  Europe.  But  men  of  the 
upper  or  educated  class  appear  wholly  indifferent  to 
theology  and  to  Christian  worship.  It  has  no  interest 
for  them.  They  are  seldom  actively  hostile  to  Chris- 
tianity, much  less  are  they  offensive  when  they  speak 
of  it,  but  they  think  it  does  not  concern  them,  and 
may  be  left  to  women  and  peasants.  The  Catholic  re- 
vival or  reaction  of  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury did  not  touch  Spanish  America,  which  is  still  under 
the  influence  of  the  anti-Catholic  current  of  the  later 
eighteenth.  The  Roman  Church  in  Spain  and  Portugal 
was  then,  and  indeed  is  now,  far  below  the  level  at  which 
it  stands  in  France,  Germany,  and  Italy.  Its  worship  was 
more  formal,  its  pressure  on  the  laity  far  heavier,  its 
clergy  less  exemplary  in  their  lives.  In  Spanish  America 
the  obscurantism  was  at  least  as  great  and  the  other 
faults  probably  greater.  There  was  not  much  persecu- 
tion, partly,  no  doubt,  because  there  was  hardly  any 
heterodoxy,  and  the  victims  of  the  Inquisition  were  com- 
paratively few.  But  the  ministers  of  religion  had  ceased 
not  only  to  rouse  the  soul,  but  to  supply  a  pattern  for 
conduct.  There  were  always  some  admirable  men  to  be 
found  among  them,  some  prelates  models  of  piety  and 
virtue,  some  friars  devoted  missionaries  and  humanely 
zealous  in  their  efforts  to  protect  the  Indians.  Still  the 
church  as  a  whole  had  lost  its  hold  on  the  conscience  and 
thought  of  the  best  spirits,  and  that  hold  it  has  never 
regained.  In  saying  this  I  am  comparing  Catholic  South 
America  not  with  the  Protestant  countries  of  Europe,  but 
with  such  Roman  Catholic  countries  as  France,  Rhenish 


ii2         THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

Prussia,  and  Bavaria,  in  all  of  which  the  Roman  Church 
is  a  power  in  the  world  of  thought  and  morals.  In  east- 
ern Europe  the  Orthodox  Church  has  similarly  shriveled 
up  and  ceased  to  be  an  intellectual  force,  but  there  it  has 
at  least  retained  the  affection  of  the  upper  class,  and  is 
honored  for  its  fidelity  during  centuries  .of  Mussulman 
oppression.  In  the  more  advanced  parts  of  South  Amer- 
ica it  seems  to  be  regarded  merely  as  a  harmless  Old 
World  affair  which  belongs  to  a  past  order  of  things  just 
as  much  as  does  the  rule  of  Spain,  but  which  may,  so 
long  as  it  does  not  interfere  with  politics,  be  treated  with 
the  respect  which  its  antiquity  commands.  In  both  cases 
the  undue  stress  laid  upon  the  dogmatic  side  of  theology 
and  the  formal  or  external  side  of  worship  has  resulted 
in  the  loss  of  spiritual  influence.  In  all  the  Spanish  coun- 
tries, the  church  had  trodden  down  the  laity  and  taken 
freedom  and  responsibility  from  them  more  than  befell 
anywhere  else  in  Christendom,  making  devotion  consist 
in  absolute  submission.  Thus  when  at  last  her  sway 
vanished,  her  moral  influence  vanished  with  it.  This 
absence  of  a  religious  foundation  for  thought  and  con- 
duct is  a  grave  misfortune  for  Latin  America."1 

And  Sr.  Calderon  sums  up  his  own  judgment  in  the 
words : 

"From  Mexico  to  Chile  the  religion  is  the  same;  the 
intolerance  of  alien  cults  is  the  same ;  so  are  the  clerical- 
ism, the  anti-clericalism,  the  fanaticism,  and  the  super- 
ficial free  thought;  the  influence  of  the  clergy  in  the 
state,  upon  women,  and  the  schools;  the  lack  of  true 
religious  feeling  under  the  appearance  of  general  belief .'"2 

*South  America:  Observation  and  Impressions,  582,  583. 
2  Latin  America:  Its  Rise  and  Progress,  337- 


RELIGIOUS  113 

IV.  THE  CHRISTIAN  RESPONSIBILITY 

In  the  light  of  all  the  facts  it  is  declared,  and  surely 
with  justice,  that  the  evangelical  churches  have  a  funda- 
mental obligation  to  extend  their  help  to  Latin  America 
and  that  evangelical  Christianity  need  not  hesitate  to 
declare  that  through  the  acceptance  and  application  of 
the  gospel  of  Christ,  the  highest  hopes  of  the  earnest 
leaders  of  Latin  America  can  be  fulfilled  wherein  they 
are  right,  and  transcended  wherein  they  are  imperfect; 
and  that  the  true  welfare  of  the  republics  can  be  realized 
in  the  establishment  of  what  Jesus  meant  by  the  kingdom 
of  God. 

What,  then,  should  be  the  burden  and  application  of 
the  Christian  message  for  Latin  America  to-day? 

The  Christian  Message.  "First  of  all  these  democ- 
racies have  a  right  to  hear,  and  it  is  the  church's  solemn 
duty  to  proclaim  the  primary  gospel  of  Christ,  the  evan- 
gelical message  of  the  New  Testament,  the  essentials  of 
Christianity,  primitive  and  pure,  the  clear  notes  of  a 
redeeming  evangel,  unencumbered  either  by  the  ecclesi- 
astical accretions  of  Roman  Catholicism  or  by  ultra- 
sectarian  forms  and  dogmas  of  Protestantism,  and  the 
confident  assertion  that  the  true  Christian  church  is  the 
home  and  should  be  the  propelling  force  of  true  democ- 
racy. •.  .  . 

"The  leaders  of  the  Latin- American  revolutions  sought 
in  certain  forms  of  social  idealism  for  the  secret  of 
political  organization  and  commercial  order  in  the  new 
republics.  They  sought  in  vain.  For  no  system  of 
government  needs  religious  ideals,  the  conception  of  the 
will  of  God  concerning  man,  more  than  a  democracy. 


H4        THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS 

Liberty,  equality,  fraternity  were  religious  principles, 
elements  of  the  life  of  Christian  churches,  before  they 
ever  became  potent  war  cries  of  revolution  and  ideals 
of  society  in  general.  Apart  from  their  religious  origin 
and  inspiration,  these  three  great  ideals  have  neither 
truth  or  potency.  It  is  the  Christian  gospel  which  first 
established  them  as  working,  organizing  forces.  From 
the  Christian  churches  they  passed  over  into  the  general 
consciousness  of  modern  nations.  But  apart  from  the 
Christ,  and  his  revelation  of  the  Father's  will  and  purpose 
concerning  man,  they  have  no  reality.  It  is  their  passion 
for  democracy  which  should  lead  the  rulers  and  philoso- 
phers, the  statesmen  and  lecturers  of  Latin  America 
back  to  Christ.  For  his  kingship  is  the  only  real  source 
of  that  individual  liberty,  that  mystic  equality,  that  uni- 
versal fraternity,  whose  glory  appears  in  the  Christian 
life,  whose  ideals  are  striven  after  passionately  by  the 
evangelical  churches,  whose  partial  fruits  are  seen  in  the 
incomplete  democracies  of  the  modern  world."1 

Are  not  all  those  who  perceive  that  these  treasures 
are  laid  up  for  them  in  Christ,  and  that  in  Christ  alone 
they  can  be  found,  and  that  men  and  nations  alike  are 
hopeless  without  them,  bound  to  share  what  they  know 
with  other  men?  Whether  these  other  men  be  within 
our  own  race  and  nation  or  without  it  is  of  no  conse- 
quence, or  whether  they  be  of  nations  near  by  or  far 
away,  of  nations  like  our  own,  nominally  Christian,  or 
of  non-Christian  nations  across  the  seas.  Ever  those 
who  can  help  must  help.  And  if  any  services  in  offering 
men  the  clear  gift  of  Christ  undimmed  by  institution  or 


1 Report  of  Commission  II  to  the  Panama  Congress,  22,  44,  45. 


RELIGIOUS  115 

tradition  can  be  given  by  us  to  Latin  America,  the  duty 
is  not  more  and  not  less  because  they  are  near  and  be- 
cause they  bear  kindred  names.  In  Bishop  Brent's 
biography  of  Bishop  Satterlee  is  preserved  a  statement 
of  Dr.  Satterlee' s  at  the  time  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church  was  considering  its  relations  to  Mexico,  and 
Dr.  Satterlee  with  others  was  urging  that  it  was  the 
.Church's  duty  to  go  in  and  to  give  its  aid.  "The  appeal," 
said  he,  "is  from  our  brothers  who  are  struggling  out  of 
ignorance,  superstition,  and  darkness  into  light,  faith,  and 
knowledge,  and  it  seems  to  be  a  strange  idea,  that  while 
we  are  in  duty  bound  to  carry  the  gospel  to  the  heathen, 
we  should  not  go  to  the  help  of  our  brethren  in  Mexico 
because  they  are  our  brethren.  That  which  one  would 
think  would  give  them  a  double  claim  upon  us  is  made 
the  plea  why  we  should  recognize  no  claim  at  all/'  And 
Dr.  Satterlee  added  the  question  which  John  so  pene- 
tratingly asks,  "Whoso  hath  this  world's  good,  and  seeth 
his  brother  have  need,  and  shutteth  up  his  compassion 
from  him,  how  dwelleth  the  love  of  God  in  him?" 

Is  that  love  in  us?  If  it  is,  there  can  be  but  one  issue. 
We  shall  seek,  each  man  in  the  work  of  the  body  with 
which  he  is  connected,  to  enlarge  the  agencies  of  the 
Christian  churches  for  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  of  the 
New  Testament  in  Latin  America,  and  we  shall  repre- 
sent in  all  our  own  thoughts  and  attitudes  toward  Latin 
America,  and  demand  that  our  nation  represent  in  its 
declarations  and  in  its  deeds,  the  principles  of  that  gospel. 


MISSION  STUDY  COURSES 


'Anywhere,  provided  it  be  FORWARD." — David  Livingstone 


Prepared  under  the  direction  of  the 
MISSIONARY  EDUCATION  MOVEMENT 

OF    THE    UNITED    STATES    AND    CANADA 


EDUCATIONAL,  COMMITTEE:  G.  F.  Sutherland,  Chairman; 
A.  E.  Armstrong,  J.  I.  Armstrong,  Hugh  L.  Burleson, 
E.  C.  Cronk,  W.  E.  Doughty,  H.  Paul  Douglass,  Arthur 
R.  Gray,  R.  A.  Hutchison,  B.  Carter  Millikin,  John  M. 
Moore,  John  H.  Poorman,  James  K.  Quay,  T,  Bronson  Ray. 


The  aim  of  the  Movement  is  to  publish  a  series  of  text- 
books covering  the  various  home  and  foreign  mission  fields 
and  problems  and  written  by  leading  authorities. 

The  following  text-books  having  a  sale  of  over  1,750,000 
have  been  published : 

1.  THE   PRICE  OF  AFRICA.     Biographical.     By   S.   Earl 
Taylor. 

2.  INTO  ALL  THE  WORLD.    A  general  survey  of  missions. 
By  Amos  R.  Wells. 

3.  PRINCELY  MEN  IN  THE  HEAVENLY   KINGDOM.     Bio- 
graphical.    By  Harlan  P.  Beach. 

4.  SUNRISE  IN  THE  SUNRISE  KINGDOM.    Revised  Edition. 
A  study  of  Japan.     By  John  H.  DeForest. 

5.  HEROES  OF  THE  CROSS  IN  AMERICA.    Home  Missions. 
Biographical.     By  Don  O.  Shelton. 

6.  DAYBREAK  IN  THE  DARK  CONTINENT.     Revised  Edi- 
tion.    A  study  of  Africa.     By  Wilson  S.  Naylor. 

7.  THE   CHRISTIAN   CONQUEST   OF   INDIA.     A   study   of 
India.    By  James  M.  Thoburn. 

8.  ALIENS  OR  AMERICANS?  A  study  of  Immigration.  By 
Howard  B.  Grose. 


MISSION  STUDY  COURSES 

9.  THE  UPLIFT  OF  CHINA.    Revised  Edition.    A  study  of 
China.    By  Arthur  H.  Smith. 

10.  THE  CHALLENGE  OF  THE  CITY.    A  study  of  the  City. 
By  Josiah  Strong. 

11.  THE  WHY  AND  How  OF  FOREIGN  MISSIONS.    A  study 
of  the  relation  of  the  home  Church  to  the  foreign  mis- 
sionary enterprise.     By  Arthur  J.  Brown. 

12.  THE  MOSLEM  WORLD.    A  study  of  the  Mohammedan 
world.    By  Samuel  M.  Zwemer. 

13.  THE  FRONTIER.     A   study  of   the   New  West.     By 
Ward  Platt. 

14.  SOUTH  AMERICA  :  Its  Missionary  Problems.    A  study 
of  South  America.     By  Thomas  B.  Neely. 

15.  THE  UPWARD  PATH  :  The  Evolution  of  a  Race.    A 
study  of  the  Negro.    By  Mary  Helm. 

16.  KOREA   IN    TRANSITION.     A   study   of    Korea.     By 
James  S.  Gale. 

17.  ADVANCE  IN  THE  ANTILLES.     A  study  of  Cuba  and 
rto  Rico.     By  Howard  B.  Grose. 

18.  THE   DECISIVE   HOUR  OF   CHRISTIAN  -  MISSIONS.     A 
study  of  conditions   throughout  the  non-Christian  world. 
By  John  R.  Mott. 

19.  INDIA  AWAKENING.     A  study  of  present  conditions 
in  India.     By  Sherwood  Eddy. 

20.  THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  OPEN  COUNTRY.     A  study  of 
the  problem  of  the  Rural  Church.    By  Warren  H.  Wilson. 

21.  THE  CALL  OF  THE  WORLD.     A  survey  of  conditions 
at  home  and  abroad  of  challenging  interest  to  men.     By 
W.  E.  Doughty. 

22.  THE  EMERGENCY  IN  CHINA.    A  study  of  present-day 
conditions  in  China.    By  F.  L.  Hawks  Pott. 

23.  MEXICO  TO-DAY  :  Social,  Political,  and  Religious  Con- 
ditions.    A    study   of   present-day    conditions    in    Mexico. 
By  George  B.  Winton. 

24.  IMMIGRANT  FORCES.   A  study  of  the  immigrant  in  his 
home  and  American  environment.    By  William  P.  Shriver. 

25.  THE   NEW   ERA   IN   ASIA.     Contrast   of    early   and 
present  conditions  in  the  Orient.     By  Sherwood  Eddy. 

26.  THE  SOCIAL  ASPECTS  OF  FOREIGN  MISSIONS.    A  study 
of    the    social    achievements    of     foreign    missions.      By 
W.  H.  P.  Faunce. 

27.  THE  NEW  HOME  MISSIONS.     A  study  of  the  social 
achievements  and  social  program  of  home  missions.     By 
H.  Paul  Douglass. 

28.  THE   AMERICAN   INDIAN   ON   THE   NEW   TRAIL.     A 
story  of  the  Red  Men  of  the  United  States  and  the  Chris- 
tian gospel.    By  Thomas  C.  Moffett. 


MISSION  STUDY  COURSES 

29.  THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  SOCIAL  GOSPEL.  '  A  study 
of  the  individual  in  the  local  church  and  his  relation  to  the 
social  message  of  the  gospel.     By  Shailer  Mathews. 

30.  RISING   CHURCHES   IN   NON-CHRISTIAN   LANDS.     A 
study  of   the  native   Church  and   its   development   in  the 
foreign  mission  field.    By  Arthur  J.  Brown. 

31.  THE    CHURCHES    AT    WORK.     A    statement    of    the 
work  of  the  churches  in  the  local  community  in  the  United 
States.     By  Charles  L.  White. 

32.  EFFICIENCY    POINTS.      The    Bible,    Service,    Giving, 
Prayer — four  conditions  of  efficiency.    By  W.  E.  Doughty. 

33.  SOUTH   AMERICAN   NEIGHBORS.     A  study  of   South 
America,  including  the  results  of  the  Panama  Conference. 
By  Homer  C.   Stuntz. 

34.  THE  SOUTH  TO-DAY.    A  study  of  the  religious  life 
of  the  Southern  States.    By  John  M.  Moore. 

35.  THE  UNITY  OF  THE  AMERICAS.    A  discussion  of  the 
relations    of    commerce,    education,    politics,    and    religion 
between  the  Americas.     By  Robert  E.  Speer. 

In  addition  to  the  above  courses,  the  following  have  been 
published  especially  for  use  among  younger  persons : 

1.  UGANDA'S    WHITE    MAN   OF   WORK.     The    story    of 
Alexander  M.  Mackay  of  Africa.    By  Sophia  Lyon  Fahs. 

2.  SERVANTS  OF  THE  KING.    A  series  of  eleven  sketches 
of  famous  home  and  foreign  missionaries.     By  Robert  E. 
Speer. 

3.  UNDER  MARCHING  ORDERS.    The  story  of  Mary  Porter 
Gamewell  of   China.     By   Ethel   Daniels   Hubbard. 

4.  WINNING  THE  OREGON  COUNTRY.  The  story  of  Marcus 
Whitman    and   Jason    Lee    in    the    Oregon    country.     By 
John  T.  Paris. 

5.  THE    BLACK    BEARDED    BARBARIAN.      The    story    of 
George  Leslie  Mackay  of  Formosa.     By  Marian  Keith. 

6.  LIVINGSTONE  THE  PATHFINDER.     The  story  of  David 
Livingstone.     By  Basil  Mathews. 

7.  ANN  OF  AVA.     The  story  of  Ann  Hasseltine  Judson 
of  Burma.     By  Ethel  Daniels  Hubbard. 

8.  COMRADES  IN  SERVICE.     Eleven  brief  biographies  of 
Christian  workers.    By  Margaret  E.  Burton. 

9.  MAKERS   OF    SOUTH    AMERICA.      Sketches    of   twelve 
epoch-making    leaders    in    South    American    history.      By 
Margarette  Daniels. 

These  books  are  published  by  mutual  arrangement  among 
the  home  and  foreign  mission  boards,  to  whom  all  orders 
should  be  addressed.  They  are  bound  uniformly  and  are 
sold  at  60  cents  in  cloth,  and  40  cents  in  paper;  prepaid. 
Nos.  21,  29,  32,  and  35  are  25  cents  in  cloth,  prepaid. 


MAY  221917 


